UBRMf 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
RIVERSIDE 


&r 


REMINISCENCES 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NKW  YORK    •    BOSTON  •    CHICAGO 
ATLANTA  •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON   •    BOMBAY   •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


6 


REMINISCENCES 


BY 

GOLDWIN  SMITH,  D.C.L. 

u ' 

EDITED   BY 

ARNOLD   HAULTAIN,  M.A. 


ILLUSTRATED 


Nefo 

THE  MACMILLAN   COMPANY 
1910 

AH,  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,    1910, 

BY  THE  8.  S.  McCLUKE  COMPANY, 
BY  THE  ATLANTIC  MONTHLY  COMPANY, 
BY  THE  ONTARIO  PUBLISHING  COMPANY, 

AND 

BT  THE  SUN  FEINTING  AND  PUBLISHING  ASSOCIATION. 

COPYBIGHT,    1910, 

BY  THEODORE  ARNOLD  HAULTAIN. 


Set  up  and  clectrotyped.    Published  November,  1910. 


KotinooD 

J.  8.  Cashing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


PREFACE 

BY  THE  EDITOR 

I  HAVE  ventured  to  put  my  name  on  the  title- 
page  of  this  book  because  its  author  assigned  to 
me  the  task  of  preparing  it  for  the  press. 

That  task  has  been  a  difficult  one.  The  bulk 
of  the  book  was  not  composed  till  the  writer  had 
passed  his  seventy-fifth  year;  and  although  the 
manuscript  was  first  written  out  by  the  author's 
own  hand,  then  dictated  to  me,  twice  type-written, 
and  constantly  revised,  yet  not  only  is  a  septuagen- 
arian's memory  apt  to  slip,  but  a  septuagenarian's 
solicitude  for  accuracy  is  apt  to  be  labile  also.  I 
have  corrected  many  errors ;  probably  many  still 
remain  uncorrected.  If  so,  I  must  plead  that  the 
work  of  editing  was  done  in  haste,  and  done  some 
three  thousand  miles  from  the  British  Museum  or 
the  Bodleian. 

Again,  much  of  the  manuscript  was  in  a  chaotic 
state;  some  of  the  chapters,  indeed,  consisted 


vi  PREFACE 

merely  of  fragmentary  and  inconsequent  para- 
graphs. With  these  I  have  dealt  as  best  I  could. 

My  own  pen  has  hardly  anywhere  intruded 
itself :  it  is  not  for  me  to  despoil  the  book  of  its 
peculiarities  —  even  of  its  repetitions. 

Elderly  (and  erudite)  readers,  however,  must 
forgive  my  footnotes.  They  are  for  a  younger 
generation.  Besides,  I  have  tried  to  remember 
/  that  names  and  events  which  may  be  quite  famil- 
iar to  readers  on  one  side  of  the  Atlantic  may  be 
very  unfamiliar  to  readers  on  the  other. 

For  the  greater  number  of  these  notes,  Messrs. 
Smith,  Elder,  and  Company's  "  Dictionary  of 
National  Biography "  was  invaluable. 

I  have  sought  information  from  many  sources, 
and  amongst  the  many  to  whom  I  owe  thanks  are 
the  Reverend  the  Master  of  University  College, 
Oxford  (for  notes  on  the  bust  of  King  Alfred) ; 
the  Right  Honourable  Sir  Roland  L.  B.  Vaughan 
Williams,  Lord  Justice  of  the  Court  of  Appeal; 
the  Editor  of  The  Spectator;  Sir  J.  Gardner  D. 
Engleheart,  K.C.B. ;  the  Reverend  Professor  Wil- 
liam Clark,  of  Toronto ;  Mr.  Mansfeldt  de  Car- 
donnel  Findlay,  C.M.G. ;  Herr  Franz  H.  Bassenge, 


PREFACE  vii 

British  Vice-Consul  at  Dresden;  Mr.  Arthur  W. 
Kaye  Miller,  Assistant  Keeper  of  Printed  Books 
at  the  British  Museum;  Mrs.  Place,  of  Skelton 
Grange,  Yorkshire  (a  cousin  of  Mr.  Goldwin 
Smith) ;  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison ;  the  Lady  Frances 
Bushby;  Constance  Lady  Russell,  of  Swallowfield ; 
the  Right  Honourable  G.  W.  E.  Russell;  Mr.  Wil- 
liam Prideaux  Courtney;  Mr.  W.  George  Eakins, 
Librarian  of  the  Law  Society  of  Upper  Canada, 
Osgoode  Hall,  Toronto ;  Mr.  George  William  Harris, 
Ph.B.,  Librarian  of  Cornell  University. 

I  wish  also  here  to  thank  Dr.  J.  G.  Schurman, 
President  of  Cornell  University,  and  the  Executive 
Committee  of  his  Board  of  Trustees,  for  a  gener- 
osity which  has  enabled  me  to  edit  these  Remi- 
niscences in  the  room  in  which  they  were  written; 
in  the  room  in  which,  side  by  side,  then*  writer 
and  I  worked  for  more  than  seventeen  years;  the 
room  in  which  I  watched  that  writer  breathe  his 
last. 

THE  LIBRARY,  THE  GRANGE, 

TORONTO,  CANADA,  November,  1910. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  I 
BOYHOOD.    1823-1834 

PAGES 

Reading — Social  Life — My  Father  and  Family  —  Our  House 

—  Old  Customs 1-11 

CHAPTER  II 
MORTIMER.    1848-1867 

The  Parish  —  Rural  Society  —  Fox-hunting—  The  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington —  Miss  Mitford  —  Sir  Henry  Russell — John  Walter 

—  Sir  John   Mowbray  —  Lord  Lyon  —  Sir  Roderick  and 
Lady  Murchison 12-31 

CHAPTER  III 
SCHOOL.    1831-1840 

School  —  Schoolmates —  Eton  —  Dr.  Goodall,  the  Provost  —  The 
Head  Master,  Hawtrey —  William  IV  —  Queen  Victoria — 
Schoolmates 32-49 

CHAPTER   IV 
OXFORD.     1841-1845 

Dean  Gaisf  ord  —  Magdalen  —  Magdalen  Demys  —  Martin  Routh 

—  Fellows  of  Magdalen — The  Tractarian  Movement —  The 
Curriculum — Oxford  Life  —  Contemporaries       .        .         50-74 

CHAPTER  V 
OXFORD  TUTORSHIP.    1851-1854 

Fellows  —  Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley  —  Benjamin  Jowett  —  Thor- 

old  Rogers  —  Mark  Pattison  —  Sir  Travers  Twiss         .         75-87 

ix 


X  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   VI 

TRAVELS.    1847 

PASmS 

The  Tyrol  —  Dresden  —  Prague  —  Normandy  —  Guizot  —  Italy 

—  Italian  Exiles  —  Louis  Blanc 88-97 

CHAPTER   VII 
UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS.    1854-1858 

The  Unreformed  University  —  The  Commissioners  —  Dr.  Jeune 

—  Liddell  — Tait  —  Johnson  —  The   Report  — The    Bill— 
The  Executive  Commission  —  The  Executive  Commission- 
ers— Richard  Bethell,  Lord  Westbury —  The  Commissioners' 
Report 98-115 

CHAPTER  VIII 

EDUCATION  COMMISSION.    1858-1861 

The  Commissioners  —  William  Charles  Lake  —  Nassau  Senior 

—  James  Eraser  —  Popular  Education  .        .        .        .     116-120 

CHAPTER   IX 

LAW.    1846 

Lincoln's  Inn  —  On  Circuit  —  English  and  American  Courts  of 
Justice  —  Criminal  Law  —  Judges  —  The  Bar — Sir  Gardner 
Engleheart  — Briton  Riviere 121-131 

CHAPTER   X 
LONDON.    1845-1861 

Macaulay  —  Samuel  Rogers  —  Lord  Hough  ton  —  Henry  Hallam 

—  Milman  —  Thackeray  —  Croker  —  Tyndall  —  Herbert 
Spencer  —  "The  Grange"  —  Lady  Ashburton  —  Carlyle  — 
Tennyson — Bishop  Wilberforce  —  Lady  Waldegrave  —  Par- 
liamentary    Debates  —  The     Theatre  —  Louis     Blanc  — 
Brougham  — Lady  Dukinfield 132-160 


CONTENTS  xi 

CHAPTER  XI 

JOURNALISM.     1855-1858 

PAOB8 

Peel  —  The  Saturday  Review  —  Members  of  the  Staff — Froude 

—  Letters  on  the  Empire 161-173 

CHAPTER   XII 
CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN 

Peel  —  Disraeli  —  "Lothair"  —  Bentinck  —  The  Duke  of  New- 
castle —  Cardwell  —  "  Welbeck  "  —  Gladstone  —  The  Peel- 
ites — Sidney  Herbert  —  Canning  —  Dalhousie  —  Sir  James 
Graham  —  Lord  Aberdeen  —  Russell  —  Granville  —  Godley 

—  Joseph  Chamberlain  —  Earl  Grey      ....     174-214 

CHAPTER   XIII 
THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL 

Objects  of  the  School  —  Peace  Policy  —  Anti-Imperialism  — 
Bright  and  Cobden  —  Socialism  —  Property  —  The  Irish 
Question 215-237 

CHAPTER   XIV 

BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN 

Bright's  Oratory  —  Cobden  —  His  Politics  —  Peel  —  Disraeli  — 

Peel  as  a  Party  Leader  .    .    ,        .        .        .        .        .     238-271 

CHAPTER   XV 
OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP.    1858-1866 

Settling  at  Oxford  —  Telepathy  —  Halford  Vaughan  —  Henry 
Smith  —  Max  Miiller  —  Monier  Williams  —  Thorold  Rogers 

—  Rolleston  —  Waring  —  Coxe  —  Froude  —  Cradock  —  The 
Great    Western    Railway  —  King    Edward    VII  —  Prince 
Leopold  — Dr.  Acland  — Gladstone       ....     272-286 


xii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XVI 

PUBLIC   EVENTS 

PAOB8 

Crimean  War  —  The  War  Passion  —  The  War  Policy  —  Napo- 
leon III  — The  Chartist  Procession  ....  287-293 

CHAPTER   XVII 

ELECTIONS 

Anthony  John  Mundella  —  Sheffield  —  Trades-Unionism  — 
Nursing  a  Constituency  —  Election  Tactics  —  The  Party 
System 294-300 

CHAPTER   XVIII 
IRELAND.     1862;  1881 

Cardwell  as  Irish  Secretary  —  The  Irish  People  —  Irish  Liberals 

—  Crime   in   Ireland  —  Education  —  Social   Life  —  Robert 
Lowe  —  Second  Visit  to  Ireland  —  Lord  O'Hagan — Royal 
Visits    to    Ireland  —  W.    E.    Forster  —  Gladstone's    Irish 
Policy 301-318 

CHAPTER  XIX 

AMERICAN   CIVIL   WAR.     1861-1865 

Secession  —  Its  True  Character  —  Lincoln's  View —  The  Alabama 
Claim  —  Attitude  of  the  British  Government  —  British  Lib- 
erals —  Visits  to  the  United  States  —  Friends  in  the  United 
States  —  J.  M.  Forbes  —  Emerson  —  Lowell  —  Bancroft  — 
The  Attitude  of  the  North  —  Finance  —  General  Butler  — 
The  Opposing  Forces  —  General  Grant  —  Sherman  —  Gen- 
eral Meade  —  Lee  —  General  Butler  Again  —  Washington 

—  Seward  —  Abraham  Lincoln 319-356 

CHAPTER  XX 

JAMAICA.     1866 

Conflict  of  Races  —  Outbreak  —  Governor  Eyre's  Action — The 
Jamaica  Committee  —  Chief  Justice  Cockburn's  Charge — 


CONTENTS  xiii 

PAGES 

John  Stuart  Mill  —  Woman  Suffrage  —  Thomas  Hughes  — 
Frederick  Denison  Maurice  —  Manchester  Liberals      .     357-364 


CHAPTER   XXI 

CORNELL.    1868-1871 

Resignation  of  Oxford  Professorship  —  Invitation  to  Cornell  — 
Ezra  Cornell  —  The  University  —  Cornell's  Ideas  —  Arrival 
at  Ithaca  —  Fellow  Lecturers  —  Life  at  Ithaca  —  The  Oneida 
Community  —  Friends  at  Cornell 365-379 


CHAPTER   XXII 

VISITS  TO  EUROPE 

Reading  —  Magdalen  —  Oxford  —  Spiritualism  —  Ignorance  of 
Canada —  Knaresborough  —  Curious  Crimes  —  Italy —  Flor- 
ence—  Venice  —  Ravenna  —  Second  Visit  to  Italy  —  Sicily 
—  The  Mafia  —  Pizzo  —  Italian  Cruelty  —  Amalfi  —  The 
Papacy  —  Capua  —  Rome  —  Florence  Again  .  .  380-398 

CHAPTER   XXIII 

VISITS  TO   WASHINGTON 

Settling  in  Canada  —  Washington  —  Bancroft  —  Bayard  —  The 
Pensions  Bill  —  The  Capitol  —  American  Oratory  —  Ameri- 
can Statesmanship  —  Washington  Society  —  The  Party 
System  —  Newspaper  Reporters  —  E.  L.  Godkin  .  .  399-413 

CHAPTER   XXIV 

VISITS   TO   THE   NORTH-WEST.     1870;  1888;  1889 

The  North- West  —  Winnipeg  —  Skye  Crofters  —  Immigration  — 
Annexation  —  The  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  —  The  Rocky 
Mountains  —  British  Columbia  ....  414-423 


xiv  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XXV 
CANADIAN  POLITICS 

PAOBB 

The  Relation  of  Canada  to  the  Imperial  Country  —  Confedera- 
tion—  Quebec  —  Titles  for  Colonists  —  Political  Parties  — 
Sir  John  Macdonald — George  Brown  —  Alexander  Mac- 
kenzie —  Edward  Blake  —  John  Sandfield  Macdonald  — 
Joseph  Howe  —  Francis  Hincks  —  Sir  Richard  Cartwright 
—  Sir  Charles  Tupper  —  The  Destiny  of  the  Colonies  —  An- 
nexation —  "  Canada  First "  —  The  Irish  Question  —  Free 
Trade  —  Reciprocity  —  The  Temperance  Question  —  The 
Patrons  of  Industry  —  The  Weekly  Sun  .  .  .  424-449 

CHAPTER   XXVI 

MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA.    1871-1910 

Marriage  —  "The  Grange" — Our  Household — General  Mid- 
dleton  —  Civic  Charities  —  The  Governor-Generalship  — 
The  Athletic  Club  —  Literary  Opportunities  —  The  Uni- 
versity Question  —  Sports  —  Last  Days  .  .  .  450-465 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

GOLDWIN  SMITH Frontispiece 

Photograph  by  Elliot  and  Fry. 

FACING   PAGES 

DR.  RICHARD  PRITCHARD  SMITH 12 

Goldwin  Smith's  Father. 

FACSIMILE  OF  LAST  PARAGRAPH  ON  PAGE  25  .        .        .        .25 

GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY  YEARS  OF  AGE         .        .      75 
Photograph  by  J.  H.  Guggenheim,  Oxford. 

GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY  YEARS  OF  AGE         .        .     132 

Copy  of  a  photograph  by  Mayall,  of  Brighton.  (The  original 
hangs  in  the  Common  Room  of  University  College,  Oxford.) 

FACSIMILE  OF  PARAGRAPH  ON  PAGE  183 183 

Showing  (i)  original  manuscript  (as  dictated  to  me) ;  (ii)  an 
addition  in  pencil,  and  (iii)  an  emendation  in  ink,  by  the 
author. 

PHOTOGRAPH  OF  A  BUST  OF  GOLDWIN  SMITH          .        .        .    272 
Made  at  Oxford  about  1866,  by  Alexander  Munro. 

GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY-FIVE  YEARS  OF  AGE        .     365 
Photograph  by  C.  H.  Howes,  of  Ithaca,  N.Y. 

GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  SEVENTY-FIVE  YEARS  OF  AGE         .    "    .    399 
Photograph  by  Dixon,  of  Toronto. 

GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  SEVENTY-FIVE  YEARS  OF  AGE         .        .    424 
Photograph  by  Dixon,  of  Toronto. 

THE  GRANGE .        .450 

Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  house  at  Toronto. 

PHOTOGRAPH  OF  A  DEATH-MASK  OF  GOLDWIN  SMITH      .        .     464 
Made  by  Mr.  Walter  S.  Allward,  of  Toronto,  on  June  the  ninth, 
1910. 

IV 


REMINISCENCES 

CHAPTER  I 

BOYHOOD 

1823-1834 

Reading  —  Social  Life  —  My  Father  and  Family — Our  House  — 
Old  Customs. 

THE  old  town  of  Reading,  with  its  still  quaint-looking 
streets,  its  ruined  abbey  and  friary,  its  memories  of 
medieval  Congresses  and  Roundhead  sieges,  sleeps,  as 
my  memory  paints  it,  in  the  summer  sun.  It  is  a  very 
quiet  place.  The  mail-coaches  travelling  on  the  Bath 
road  at  the  marvellous  rate  of  twelve  miles  an  hour 
change  horses  at  The  Crown  and  the  Bear.  So  do  the 
travelling  carriages  and  post-chaises  of  the  wealthier 
wayfarer.  The  watchman  calls  the  hour  of  the  night. 
From  the  tower  of  old  St.  Lawrence's  Church  the  curfew 
is  tolled.  My  nurse  lights  the  fire  with  the  tinder-box. 
Over  at  Caversham 1  a  man  is  sitting  in  the  stocks.  In 
the  streets  are  figures  of  a  generation  now  bygone. 
Mrs.  Atkins  Wright,  the  great  lady  of  the  neighbour- 
hood, comes  in  with  her  carriage-and-four,  postillions 
[l  A  parish  in  Oxfordshire,  a  mile  from  Reading.] 

B  1 


2  REMINISCENCES 

in  gorgeous  liveries,  and  an  out-rider.  Mr.  Fyshe 
Palmer,1  the  Radical  Member  for  the  borough,  is  known 
by  his  Whig  costume  of  blue  coat  and  buff  waistcoat, 
with  a  curious  little  hat  stuck  on  his  powdered  head. 
The  Quaker  dress  abounds.  It  is  worn  by  Huntley 
and  Palmer,  who  keep  a  little  biscuit-shop  in  London 
Street,  where  a  little  boy  buys  cakes,  and  from  which 
has  since  sprung  the  biscuit  factory  of  the  universe. 
The  shop  of  the  principal  draper  is  the  ladies'  Club. 

Into  old  St.  Lawrence's  Church,  not  yet  restored,  the 
Mayor  and  Aldermen  march,  robed,  with  the  mace 
borne  before  them.  In  the  pulpit,  orthodoxy  drones 
undisturbed  by  Ritualism  or  the  Higher  Criticism.  The 
clerk  below  gives  out  the  Christmas  Hymn,  saying  at 
the  end  of  each  line  "Hal !  "  in  which  he  does  not  recog- 
nize an  abbreviation  of  "  Hallelujah."  On  a  high  seat 
in  a  high-backed  pew  sits  a  little  boy,  wishing  the  ser- 
mon would  end,  staring  at  the  effigy  of  St.  Lawrence  on 
the  capital  of  a  pillar  overhead,  and  wondering  what 
the  man  could  have  been  doing  on  the  gridiron.  Now 
and  then  his  ear  catches  the  sound  of  the  Beadle's 
cane  waking  up  a  slumbering  charity-boy  to  the  ortho- 
dox excellence  of  the  sermon.  Compulsory  Chapel 
at  Eton  and  Oxford  confirmed  the  impression  compul- 
sory Church  at  Reading  had  made. 

The  clergyman,  the  doctor,  the  solicitor,  the  banker, 

I1  Charles  Fyshe  Palmer,  seven  times  elected  Member  for  Read- 
ing, was  born  in  1769  and  died  in  1843.  —  See  "The  Town  of  Read- 
ing." By  W.  M.  Childs.  Reading:  University  College.  1910. 
Page  62.] 


BOYHOOD  3 

the  brewer,  the  retired  general  and  admiral  who  has 
served  under  Wellington  or  Nelson,  the  retired  mer- 
chant, the  widower  or  spinster  with  a  good  income, 
form  a  social  circle  the  members  of  which  meet  in  each 
other's  houses,  play  whist,  the  old  game  of  long  whist 
as  played  by  Sarah  Battle,  and  end  with  the  temperate 
tray  of  sandwiches  and  negus.  For  the  young  people 
there  are  county  balls,  archery  meetings,  and  other 
suitable  diversions.  There  is  no  globe-trotting,  hardly 
any  departure  from  home,  unless  it  be  for  health. 
Life,  if  it  is  not  very  lively,  is  calm ;  free  from  its  present 
restlessness,  if  it  lacks  its  present  interest.  The  young 
are  now,  perhaps,  by  pastimes  and  summer  gatherings, 
brought  more  together  than  they  were  in  those  days 
and  provided  with  more  pleasure.  It  may  be  doubted 
whether  the  life  of  the  elders  is  so  social.  A  friend 
with  whom  many  years  afterwards  I  was  staying  at 
Sydenham  pointed  out  to  me  from  a  hill  the  suburban 
villas,  from  the  number  of  which  it  would  be  supposed 
there  must  be  a  good  deal  of  society  in  the  place. 
"Yet,"  said  he,  " there  is  none.  You  cannot  bring 
those  people  together  for  any  purpose  whatever.  The 
man  goes  up  to  town  by  the  morning  train,  spends  the 
day  in  business,  comes  back  to  dinner,  reads  the  paper, 
and  falls  asleep.  For  two  months  each  year  the  pair 
go  into  lodgings  by  themselves  at  the  seaside."  The 
society  of  such  a  place  as  Reading,  in  my  early  days 
stationary,  so  that  people  passed  their  lives  together, 
is  now  shifting.  Those  who  have  made  their  fortune 


4  REMINISCENCES 

in  business  are  nowadays  always  changing  their  abode 
in  quest  of  an  Eden,  and  some  of  them  chase  the  vision 
till  they  die. 

In  the  pulpit  of  the  adjoining  parish  of  St.  Mary's 
the  Higher  Criticism  had  just  dawned.  Milman,1  who 
was  the  Vicar,  read  German  theology  and  gave 
his  congregation  a  slight  taste  of  it,  which  was  not 
much  relished.  He  also,  being  a  poet,  introduced  new 
hymns,  to  the  disparagement  of  Brady  and  Tate.2 
Orthodoxy  confronted  him  in  the  person  of  a  retired 
East  Indian,  whose  objections  were  sometimes  aud- 
ible in  the  Church.  One  Sunday  afternoon  the  adver- 
sary marched  out  of  Church.  It  was  supposed,  as 
a  theological  protest.  But  it  afterwards  transpired 
that  he  had  found  the  key  of  the  curry-powder  in  his 
pocket. 

From  this  state  of  things  I  have  lived  into  an  age  of 
express-trains,  ocean  greyhounds,  electricity,  bicycles, 
globe-trotting,  Evolution,  the  Higher  Criticism,  and 
general  excitement  and  restlessness.  Reading  has 
shared  the  progress.  The  Reading  of  my  boyhood 
has  disappeared  almost  over  the  horizon  of  memory. 
Whither  is  the  train  rushing,  and  where  will  the  ter- 
minus be? 

In  that  quiet  town  one  of  the  quietest  streets  was 

P  Henry  Hart  Milman,  afterwards  Dean  of  St.  Paul's ;  author 
of  "History  of  Christianity  under  the  Empire";  ."Latin  Chris- 
tianity"; etc.  1791-1868.] 

P  Nicholas  Brady  and  Nahum  Tate  wrote  a  metrical  version  of 
the  Psalms.] 


BOYHOOD  5 

Friar  Street,  in  which  my  father  lived.  He  was  a 
physician  in  very  good  practice,  personally  much 
respected,  and  very  kind  to  the  poor.  He  was  the  son 
of  the  Rector  of  Long  Marston  in  Yorkshire,  and  grand- 
son of  the  Rector  of  Wellington.  The  family,  I  believe, 
came  from  Wyburnbury  in  Cheshire,  in  the  church  of 
which  parish  there  is  a  tomb  with  armorial  bearings 
the  same  as  ours.  The  little  mansion-house  of  the 
family  at  Wyburnbury  has  disappeared;  but  its  out- 
line is  preserved  by  the  shape  of  the  modern  house 
built  upon  its  site.  I  never  attempted  to  trace  the 
pedigree.  A  genealogy  composed  by  my  brother-in- 
law,  Mr.  Homer  Dixon,1  is,  I  fear,  totally  unauthentic. 
Our  coat  of  arms  denotes  connection  with  the  Prit- 
chards,  a  Welsh  family. 

My  mother's  maiden  name  was  Breton,  a  mark  of 
Huguenot  descent.  She  was  one  of  a  numerous  family 
of  brothers  and  sisters.  She  was  the  niece  and  almost 
the  adopted  daughter  of  Mr.  Goldwin  of  Vicar's  Hill 
near  Leamington,  a  West  India  merchant,  whose  name 
I  bear. 

One  day  I  was  suddenly  called  home  from  school. 

[l  His  wife's  brother,  Benjamin  Homer  Dixon,  Knight  of  the 
Order  of  the  Netherlands  Lion,  Consul-General  of  the  Netherlands 
in  Canada.  —  See  "The  Border  or  Riding  Clans;  Followed  by  a 
History  of  the  Clan  Dickson,  and  a  Brief  Account  of  the  Family 
of  the  Author,  B.  Homer  Dixon,  K.L.N."  Albany  :  Joel  Munsell's 
Sons.  1889.  Page  213.  —  Also  "Brief  Account  of  the  Family  of 
Homer  or  de  Homere  of  Ettingshall,  Co.  Stafford,  Eng.,  and  Boston, 
Mass."  (Same  publishers  and  date.)  Page  23.  —  Also  "The 
Scotch  Border  Clan  Dickson,  the  Family  of  B.  Homer  Dixon,  and 
the  Family  of  De  Homere  or  Homer."  Toronto.  1884.  Page  35.] 


6  REMINISCENCES 

I  found  the  house  in  gloom.  I  was  taken  to  my 
mother's  bedside ;  she  spoke  to  me  very  tenderly,  then 
told  me  to  go  and  have  my  supper,  and  she  would  see 
me  again.  I  saw  her  no  more.  The  loss  of  her  was  the 
great  misfortune  of  my  life.1 

Already,  before  my  mother's  death,  three  little 
coffins  had  left  the  door.  It  is  hard  to  be  born  only  to 
suffer  and  die.  Seventy  years  afterwards,  when  I 
was  living  in  Canada,  a  drawer  which  I  had  not  before 
noticed,  in  a  desk  which  had  belonged  to  my  mother, 
being  opened,  revealed  the  relics  of  a  little  sister; 
her  hair,  her  silver  knife,  fork  and  spoon,  the  stones 
which  were  to  form  her  necklace,  the  double  guinea 
given  her  on  her  birthday.  One  boy  remained  beside 
myself.2  A  brave  boy  he  was,  and  a  good  soldier  he 
would  have  made.  He  went  with  me  to  Eton,  and  had 
just  got  his  commission 3  in  the  army  when  he  died. 
His  disease  I  have  no  doubt  was  appendicitis,  the  exist- 
ence of  which  was  unknown  in  those  days  and  for  which 
there  could  have  been  no  operation,  as  there  were  no 
anaesthetics  in  those  days. 

Our  house  hi  Friar  Street  stood  on  ground  which 
had  once  belonged  to  the  Abbey.  In  the  garden,  an 
apparent  wreck,  its  limbs  held  together  by  chains,  yet 
bearing  fruit  abundantly,  stood  a  mulberry  tree, 

I1  She  died  on  the  nineteenth  of  November,  1833,  when  Goldwin 
Smith  was  ten  years  old.] 

[2  Arthur  Smith.    Born  1827  ;  died  1845.] 

[J  The  Commission  is  dated  the  6th  and  7th  of  November, 
1843.] 


BOYHOOD  7 

believed  to  be  one  of  those  planted  in  the  time  of  Eliza- 
beth to  introduce  the  silk  trade.  The  garden  was  full 
of  the  old-fashioned  flowers  which  horticulturists  have 
now  discarded,  though  those  old  flowers,  the  moss-rose, 
the  lily-of-the-valley,  and  the  columbine,  inferior  in 
size  and  brilliancy  to  the  new,  were  perhaps  superior 
in  form.  In  an  adjoining  garden  rose  the  stately  sum- 
mer-house, with  gilded  ball,  of  Dr.  Ring,  a  leader  of 
the  Evangelical  party  in  those  days.  I  see  the  old 
man  now  playfully  shaking  his  cane  at  me  when  he  was 
on  his  way  to  a  sermon  and  I  was  galloping  off  on  my 
pony.  That  scene  the  Great  Western  Railway  has 
swept  away. 

We  children  in  those  days  at  Christmastide  looked 
joyously  forward  to  three  festivals,  —  Christmas  Eve 
and  Day,  Twelfth  Night,  and  New  Year's  Day.  At 
Christmas  there  was  in  every  household  a  feast  with 
turkey,  plum  pudding,  and  mince  pie. 

At  midnight  on  Christmas  Eve  the  child  as  he  lay  in 
bed  heard  with  ravishment  mixed  with  awe  the  music 
of  the  Waits  in  the  street.  The  Mummers,  lineal  repre- 
sentatives perhaps  of  the  Miracle  Plays  in  the  Middle 
Ages,  went  in  their  fantastic  disguises  from  house  to 
house,  singing  the  hymn,  "  Christ  is  Born  in  Bethlehem." 
All  houses  were  decked  with  the  evergreen  holly  and  its 
bright  berries,  a  piece  of  which,  by  the  way,  was  sent 
the  other  day  to  The  Grange  from  England  by  an  old 
servant  who  had  left  us  thirty  years  before.  At  Christ- 
mas the  children  looked  for  gifts,  though  I  do  not 


8  REMINISCENCES 

remember  any  Santa  Glaus.  The  poor  were  feasted, 
and  I  think  there  was  something  like  an  opening  of  all 
hearts.  We  in  Canada  —  the  Anglicans  among  us, 
at  all  events  —  have  preserved  all  this  in  some  measure, 
though  perhaps  with  some  abatement  from  the  feelings 
of  the  old  time  in  the  old  land.  Perhaps  the  feeling 
about  the  sacredness  of  the  season  and  belief  in  the 
historical  certainty  of  that  birth  in  Bethlehem  may 
have  somewhat  declined.  On  Twelfth  Night,  the  Feast 
of  the  Epiphany,  twelve  days  after  Christmas,  we  had 
parties  for  the  children,  with  feasting  on  iced  cakes 
decked  with  little  sugar  figures,  and  playing  at  snap- 
dragon, that  is,  plucking  raisins  out  of  a  dish  of  blazing 
brandy.  There  was  also  drawing  for  King  and  Queen, 
a  custom  of  which  I  never  knew  the  origin  or  the  con- 
nection with  the  ecclesiastical  festival.  New  Year's 
Day  again  brought  feastings  and  gifts,  with  good  wishes 
for  the  New  Year.  Both  on  Christmas  Day  and  on 
New  Year's  Day  there  were  family  gatherings,  more 
easily  brought  about  in  the  tight  little  island  than  they 
are  here.  I  do  not  remember  that  New  Year's  Day 
in  England  was  a  special  day  for  paying  calls,  or  that 
it  was  supposed  that  by  it  enmities  were  buried. 

Carnival  in  Protestant  England,  of  course,  there  was 
none,  except  among  the  Catholics.  To  the  Protestant 
child  in  England  Good  Friday  was,  in  fact,  a  feast, 
since  it  brought  him  hot  cross  buns.  Cries  of  "One  a 
penny,  two  a  penny,  hot  cross  buns ! "  were  heard  in 
all  the  streets. 


BOYHOOD  9 

The  next  festival,  if  it  could  be  called  one,  was  May 
Day,  the  observance  of  which  was  connected  with  no 
religious  ordinance  or  event,  with  no  Christian  ordi- 
nance at  least,  but  with  the  revival  of  nature  at  the 
coming  of  spring,  which  could  nowhere  be  more  fitly 
celebrated  than  in  England,  with  her  verdant  beauty, 
her  green  lanes,  and  hedgerows  white  with  blossoms 
of  May,  her  meadows  full  of  cowslips  and  primroses, 
her  woods  full  of  purple  and  white  hyacinths  and  vocal 
with  the  song  of  birds.  In  the  days  of  Henry  VIII 
and  Elizabeth,  May  Day  had  been  celebrated  with 
sylvan  pageantry  and  sports  under  the  greenwood  tree. 
In  later  days  the  decoration  of  the  house  with  branches 
of  May  was  about  the  only  form  of  celebration  generally 
left, 

May  Day  was  the  one  day  of  happiness  in  the  sad 
year  for  the  poor  chimney-sweeps,  children  of  misery, 
parish  orphans  for  the  most  part,  but  not  seldom  kid- 
napped for  that  most  cruel  trade.  They  came  fantas- 
tically arrayed  in  rags  of  many  colours  and  danced 
round  a  portable  bower  with  a  boy  in  it,  clattering  their 
shovels  and  brooms.  They  were  repaid  by  a  good 
dinner,  the  only  one  probably  that  they  tasted  in  the 
year.  Among  many  advances  of  humanity  this  hideous 
calling  has  now  been  long  extinct.  The  legend  was  that  -f- 
a  child,  the  son  of  a  wealthy  mother,  living  in  a  great 
mansion  where  now  the  British  Museum  stands,  had 
been  kidnapped  and  made  a  sweep ;  that  on  May  Day 
his  master  unconsciously  brought  him  to  sweep  the 


10  REMINISCENCES 

chimneys  in  his  mother's  house;  that  he  recognized 
his  old  room,  crept  into  the  bed,  and  was  found  there 
by  his  mother.  The  day  of  his  recovery  was  made  the 
Feast  of  Sweeps. 

On  the  Fifth  of  November,  when  I  was  young,  the 
boys  chaired  about  the  streets  a  stuffed  figure  of  gro- 
tesque appearance,  which  was  afterwards  burned  with 
much  shouting.  Squibs  and  crackers  were  being 
everywhere  let  off  through  the  day,  and  at  night  there 
were  fireworks.  The  grotesque  figure  was  Guy  Fawkes, 
and  the  squibs  and  fireworks  were  in  memory  of  the 
Gunpowder  Plot.  Though  the  privileges  of  childhood, 
especially  a  mischievous  privilege,  such  as  letting  off 
fireworks  in  the  streets,  are  tenacious  of  life,  I  should 
not  expect,  if  I  were  now  to  visit  England,  to  see  the 
Fifth  of  November  generally  kept  in  the  old  style. 
The  memory  of  the  Gunpowder  Plot  is  offensive  to 
Catholics,  the  feeling  against  whom  has  died  away. 

Boyhood  has  other  gala  days.  There  is  a  great 
cheese  fair,  a  relic  of  medieval  commerce,  when  the 
Forbury  is  paved  with  cheese  and  filled  with  enchanting 
booths  and  shows.  There  is  election  time,  delightful 
to  the  boy,  the  polling  lasting  for  a  week,  the  town 
being  all  the  time  paraded  by  the  rival  processions  with 
banners  and  music  and  the  whole  winding  up  with 
the  chairing  of  the  successful  candidate.  We  had  the 
greatest  day  of  all  when  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832  was 
carried,  and  the  opening  of  an  era  of  perfect  govern- 
ment and  popular  bliss  was  celebrated  in  the  Forbury 


BOYHOOD  11 

with  races,  games,  running  in  sacks,  climbing  greasy 
poles,  chasing  pigs  with  greased  tails,  and  bobbing  for 
cherries,  winding  up  with  fireworks  in  the  evening. 

Between  that  state  of  things  and  the  present  there 
is  only  a  single  lifetime ;  yet  I  feel  as  if  I  were  writing 
of  antiquity. 


CHAPTER  II 

MORTIMER 

1848- 

The  Parish  —  Rural  Society  —  Fox-hunting  —  The  Duke  of  Well- 
ington—  Miss  Mitford  —  Sir  Henry  Russell  —  John  Walter 
—  Sir  John  Mowbray  —  Lord  Lyons  —  Sir  Roderick  and  Lady 
Murchison. 

MY  father  married  again.1  His  second  wife  was 
Katherine,  daughter  of  Sir  Nathaniel  Dukinfield,2 
Baronet.  She  was  an  excellent  woman,  managed  her 
household  admirably,  and  was  very  good  to  the  poor, 
who  thronged  to  her  funeral  when  she  died.  She 
was  a  relic  of  the  old  style,  saying  'goold/  'Room/ 
(for  Rome),  'sennight '  (for  week), '  dish  of  tea.'  About 
1848,  my  father,  having  independent  means,  gave  up 

[l  "November  13,  1839. —At  Heckfleld,  R.  P.  Smith,  esq. 
M.D.,  to  Katherine,  daughter  of  the  late  Sir.  Nath.  Dukinfield, 
Bart."  —  Gentleman's  Magazine  for  January,  1839:  new  series, 
vol.  xi,  p.  89.] 

[2  Sir  Nathaniel  Dukinfleld  was  the  fifth  Baronet.  His  wife 
Katherine  was  a  sister  of  John  Warde,  the  noted  fox-hunter,  of 
Squerries  in  Kent.  Sir  Nathaniel  died  October  the  20th,  1824. 
He  was  succeeded  by  his  second  son,  John  Lloyd  Dukinfield ;  he, 
again,  in  1837,  by  his  brother,  the  Rev.  Henry  Robert  Dukinfield, 
(fourth  son  of  Nathaniel)  Vicar  of  St.  Martin's-in-the-Fields  —  at 
whose  house  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  often  stayed.  —  See  the  close  of 
Chapter  X.] 

12 


DR.  RICHARD  PRITCHARD  SMITH. 

Goldwin  Smith's  Father. 


MORTIMER  13 

his  profession,  in  which,  however,  he  had  been  very 
successful,  and  retired  to  a  country  house  at  Mortimer, 
eight  miles  from  Reading.  The  country  there,  though 
unrenowned,  was  lovely,  with  a  rich  view  of  English 
landscape  from  every  eminence.  The  parish,  while  it 
was  thoroughly  rural,  was  social,  containing  several 
mansions.  A  new  curate,  when  asked  by  the  Bishop 
whether  his  cure  was  not  very  interesting,  could  reply, 
"Very  interesting  indeed,  my  Lord;  I  have  seven 
parishioners  who  give  fish  and  soup."  Still,  even  here 
the  lot  of  the  labourer  was  hard,  and  his  life  of  toil  was 
too  apt  to  end  in  the  grim  Workhouse  which  marred 
the  beauty  of  the  landscape.  There  was  deep  pathos 
in  the  melancholy  complacency  with  which  he  looked 
forward  to  a  decent  funeral.  I  am  glad  that  I  stood  on 
the  platform  with  Joseph  Arch,1  who  had  a  good  work 
to  do  and  did  it  honestly,  with  simplicity,  and  well; 
though,  like  other  agitators,  he  may  have  found  it 
difficult  to  end  the  campaign  when  his  battle  had  been 
won. 

The  neighbourhood  was  not  unhistoric.  Hard  by 
was  Silchester  City,  with  its  massive  walls,  a  monument 
of  Imperial  Rome.  Our  windows  looked  on  a  rising 
ground  with  trees  which  in  their  disposition  still  bore 

[l  Joseph  Arch,  the  founder  of  the  National  Agricultural  La- 
bourers' Union,  and  the  strenuous  advocate  for  the  amelioration 
of  the  agricultural  labourer's  condition,  was  born  at  Barford,  in 
Warwickshire,  in  1826,  the  son  of  a  shepherd :  he  visited  Canada  in 
1873 ;  was  President  of  the  Birmingham  Radical  Union  in  1883 ; 
entered  Parliament  in  1885.] 


14  REMINISCENCES 

the  trace  of  a  Plantagenet  hunting-lodge.  Old  Upton 
Manor  House,  with  its  hiding-places  for  the  hunted 
Jesuit  or  priest,  recalled  the  religious  struggles  of  the 
Tudor  times. 

The  farmers  in  those  days  were  conservative.  They 
ploughed  with  four  horses,  they  voted  with  the  Squire. 
They  attended  the  Parish  Church,  from  neighbourly 
feeling  fully  as  much  as  on  religious  grounds.  The 
labourer  went  to  Church  rather  under  pressure,  prefer- 
ring the  little  Methodist  Chapel  in  a  sly  corner  of  the 
Parish,  the  eyesore  of  the  Parson  and  the  Squire, 
though  he  looked  to  his  Parish  Church  for  christening, 
marriage,  and  burial.  A  change  was  fast  coming  over 
the .  relation  between  the  farmer  and  the  labourer. 
They  now  no  longer  eat  at  the  same  board.  The  farm- 
er's wife  has  become  a  lady  with  a  piano,  looking 
down  on  the  farm-hands.  What  has  wrought  the 
change  ? 

The  Parson  was  the  social,  as  well  as  the  spiritual 
guide,  and  the  almoner  of  the  Parish.  Much  depended 
on  him,  especially  where  the  Squire  was  not  regularly 
resident.  Our  Parson,  Harper,  afterwards  Bishop  of 
Christ  Church,  New  Zealand,  was  excellent.  But  in 
some  neighbouring  Parishes,  especially  where  the 
Living  was  in  the  gift  of  very  close  Colleges,  and  the 
Incumbent,  truly  so  called,  was  an  old  Fellow  of  the 
College  who  had  spent  half  his  life  boozing  in  Common 
Room  while  he  was  waiting  for  preferment,  things 
were  not  so  well.  One  of  these  spiritual  Pastors  going 


MORTIMER  15 

up  to  a  College  festival  and  taking  his  Churchwarden 
with  him  was  by  the  Churchwarden  put  to  bed  in  his 
boots.  I  fancy  that  though  the  peasantry  could  not 
fail  to  be  grateful  for  the  services  of  such  a  Parson  as 
Harper  or  Fraser,1  there  was  always  in  their  minds  a 
lurking  suspicion  of  the  black  police. 

Squires  differed  as  much  as  Parsons.  On  the  average 
they  were  not  so  good;  for  a  man  must  be  made  of 
fine  clay  if  he  will  conscientiously  perform  his  duty 
when  he  is  not  obliged.  Some  Squires  were  agricul- 
tural improvers,  builders  of  model  cottages,  just  to 
the  poor.  Most  of  them,  in  those  days,  at  all  events, 
were  resident;  globe-trotting  had  not  come  in;  the 
passion  for  life  in  pleasure-cities  was  not  so  strong  as 
it  is  now.  Nor  had  agricultural  depression  and  loss 
of  rents  begun  to  drive  the  lord  of  the  mansion  from 
his  home.  Some  years  ago,  revisiting  England,  I 
was  the  guest  of  an  old  friend  in  an  historic  house  to 
which  it  was  evident  he  had  difficulty  in  clinging.  In 
walking  we  came  to  a  point  where  we  looked  across  a 
valley  to  the  new  palace  of  a  Jewish  financier,  and  I 
could  read  my  old  friend's  thoughts  in  his  face. 

Rural  society  in  England  has  been  changing,  and  so 
have  its  outward  features.  Some  years  ago  I  com- 
missioned an  artist  in  England  to  paint  for  me  a  series 
of  drawings  representing  things  as  they  had  been  in 
our  neighbourhood  when  I  was  young.  It  was  with 

[l  James  Fraser  (1818-1885),  Bishop  of  Manchester.  See  page 
20  infra.] 


16  REMINISCENCES 

difficulty  that  an  old  homestead  and  thatched  cottage 
were  found.  The  Churches,  all  but  one,  had  been 
restored  by  Ritualism,  which,  though  a  change  back- 
ward, was  a  change. 

Country  houses  were  beautiful;  but  in  country 
society  there  was  no  enchantment.  You  rolled  eight 
or  ten  miles  to  a  large  dinner  party ;  you  talked  horses 
and  roads,  heard  perhaps  after  dinner  some  lady  play 
her  grand  piece  on  the  piano ;  and  rolled  home  again. 
There  were  county  balls  and,  in  Summer,  archery 
meetings.  Garden  parties  were  not  yet.  For  the 
men  the  cover-side  was  the  Club.  Next  to  the  Lord- 
Lieutenant  in  importance  was  the  Master  of  the  Hounds. 
Our  Master  of  the  Hounds,  when  I  was  first  at  Mortimer, 
was  Sir  John  Cope.1  He  lived  at  Bramshill,  a  palace 
built  by  James  I  on  the  skirt  of  what  was  then  a  forest 
country  as  a  hunting-box  for  his  son,  Prince  Henry, 
whose  guest  Archbishop  Abbot  was  when  he  acciden- 
tally killed  the  Keeper.  Sir  John  was  a  type  of  his  class. 
He  hunted  a  wide  country.  In  Winter  his  life  was 
spent  in  the  saddle;  in  Summer  in  training  horses. 
He  swore  in  good  old  style.  "Sir  John's  pretty  well 
in  his  swearing,  sir,"  was  his  groom's  answer  to  my 
father's  inquiry  after  his  health.  Having  no  wife  or 
child,  he  lived  alone  in  that  vast  pile.  At  length  he 
became  paralyzed,  and  could  only  sit  on  the  terrace  to 
see  the  hounds  meet.  His  last  solace  was  to  have  them 

[l  Eleventh  Baronet,  second  son  of  Sir  John  Cope,  the  sixth 
Baronet.  He  died_in  1851.] 


MORTIMER  17 

called  over  by  the  Huntsman  at  his  bedside.  The 
end  of  the  fox-hunter's  life  was  apt  to  be  dreary.  I 
remember  another  of  them  who,  having  outlived  his 
Melton  set,  living,  like  Cope,  alone  in  a  great  mansion, 
and,  like  him,  paralyzed,  had  no  solace  but  shooting 
rabbits,  which  he  did  sitting  in  a  cart  on  a  music-stool, 
the  stool  enabling  him  to  turn  his  paralyzed  side  enough 
for  a  shot.  The  rabbits,  which  he  preserved,  probably 
ate  up  a  quarter  of  his  rents. 

Not  far  off  was  the  country  of  Assheton  Smith,1 
paragon  and  pride  of  all  fox-hunters,  who  hunted  his 
own  hounds  when  he  was  past  seventy  and  performed 
marvellous  feats  of  horsemanship,  clearing  a  canal  by 
leaping  on  and  off  a  barge,  leaping  up  hill  a  rail  over 
which,  when  he  had  carried  away  the  top  bar,  nobody 
could  follow.  His  horses  were  so  thoroughly  trained 
to  take  everything  at  which  he  put  them  that  one  of 
them,  when  the  rider  was  looking  back  after  a  lag 
hound,  jumped  with  him  into  the  middle  of  a  pond. 
Assheton  Smith  went  to  hunt  with  old  John  Warde,2 
a  relative  of  my  stepmother,  called  the  Father  of  Fox- 
hunting, at  Squerries,  Warde's  place  in  Kent.  There 

P  Thomas  Assheton  Smith,  born  1776 ;  educated  at  Eton  and 
Oxford ;  member  of  the  Marylebone  cricket  club ;  M.P.  for  Andover, 
1821-1832  ;  and  for  Carnarvonshire,  1832-1834 ;  master  of  the  Quorn 
hounds,  of  the  Burton  hounds,  the  Penton  hounds,  and  the  Ted- 
worth  hounds.  Died  in  1858.] 

P  John  Warde,  of  Squerries,  in  Kent,  "one  of  the  most  celebrated 
men  who  was  ever  known  in  the  hunting  world."  He  was  an 
M.F.H.  for  more  than  half  a  century.  Hunted  the  Pytchley 
country  from  1794  till  1808.] 


18  REMINISCENCES 

was  a  frost.  But  Warde  had  the  hounds  out  to  show 
them  to  his  guest.  Smith  desired  to  see  them  find  a  fox. 
Warde  consented,  but  said  he  must  whip  off  at  the 
edge  of  the  cover.  Smith  gave  a  look  which  Warde 
understood,  and  said, ' '  If  that's  what  you  mean,  get  upon 
Blue  Ruin  "  —  Warde's  favourite  horse.  Smith  got  upon 
Blue  Ruin,  had  a  run  of  twenty  minutes  over  a  frozen 
country,  and  killed.  Warde  deserved  his  sobriquet. 
Winter  after  winter  he  left  his  beautiful  mansion  to 
hunt  some  distant  county,  lodging  where  he  could, 
and  telling  his  wife  that  any  room  was  large  enough 
for  a  gentleman  in  which  he  could  put  on  his  stockings 
without  opening  the  door.  He  would  take  at  once  into 
his  service,  without  inquiry  into  character,  any  bold 
rider  or  good  driver,  sometimes  to  the  dismay  of  his 
wife,  a  worthy  woman,  who  tried  to  civilize  these  waifs. 
Looking  out  of  window  at  Hatchett's  in  Piccadilly,  he 
saw  an  urchin  drive  a  four-in-hand  coach  up  to  the 
door  in  good  style.  He  went  down  at  once  and  took 
the  urchin  into  his  service.  They  were  sitting  in  the 
drawing-room  at  Squerries  one  Sunday  evening  when 
the  urchin  was  announced  to  say  his  Collect.  Mrs. 
Warde,  who  was  rather  deaf,  went  into  the  next  room 
to  hear  him.  The  door  between  the  rooms  being  left 
ajar,  they  heard  the  urchin,  instead  of  his  Collect, 
repeat  "Dickory,  Dickory  Dock,"  etc.,  at  the  end  of 
which  he  was  praised  for  saying  his  Collect  so  well  and 
rewarded  with  a  shilling. 
There  was  a  fellow-feeling  among  fox-hunters,  at 


MORTIMER  19 

least  among  the  veterans.  My  father  found  himself 
on  his  travels,  in  a  city  where  he  was  not  known,  short 
of  cash.  He  went  to  a  Bank  and  tendered  a  cheque, 
saying  that  as  he  was  unknown  to  them,  he  would  call 
in  a  day  or  two  for  the  money.  But  the  Banker  cashed 
the  cheque  at  once,  saying,  "I  saw  you  cross  the  street; 
I  knew  from  your  gait  that  you  were  a  fox-hunter; 
you  are  sure  to  be  honest."  I  had  myself  once  to  meet 
in  conference  a  Tory  Peer,  who  evidently  regarded  me, 
as  a  Liberal,  with  some  suspicion ;  but  it  happening  to 
come  out  that  I  followed  the  hounds,  his  brow  seemed 
to  clear,  and  our  conference  proceeded  happily.  He 
probably  thought  that  in  any  man  who  followed  the 
hounds  there  must  be  a  remnant  of  good. 

There  were  still  hunting  parsons.  We  had  one  in 
our  parish,  who,  however,  had  given  up  his  profession 
and  was  said  only  to  put  on  a  white  tie  when  he  was 
going  to  deal  for  a  horse.  There  was  another  near  us 
who,  when  sentiment  grew  stricter,  was  called  to  ac- 
count by  the  Bishop.  "Mr.  Blank,  I  have  not  a  word 
to  say  against  your  ministrations.  But  this  is  a  tat- 
tling world,  and  they  tell  me  that  you  hunt."  "It  is 
indeed  a  tattling  world,  my  Lord.  They  say  your 
Lordship  goes  to  the  Queen's  balls."  "It  is  true  that 
when  I  am  invited  by  Her  Majesty  I  do  not  think  it 
proper  to  decline.  But  I  am  never  in  the  room  in 
which  the  dancing  is  going  on."  "That  is  just  my  case, 
my  Lord.  I  have  only  one  old  mare,  and  I  am  never 
in  the  field  in  which  the  hounds  are." 


20  REMINISCENCES 

James  Fraser,1  afterwards  Bishop  of  Manchester, 
was  rector  of  the  next  parish.  He  was  no  less  first- 
rate  as  a  horseman  than  he  was  afterwards  as  Bishop, 
the  firm  seat  and  light  hand  perhaps  still  coming  into 
play.  Kingsley  2  was  to  be  met  in  the  hunting-field. 
Perhaps  this  helped  him  with  Sir  John  Cope,  who  was 
patron  of  the  good  living  of  Eversley. 

The  farmers  in  those  days  could  afford  to  share  the 
sport,  and,  provided  you  kept  clear  of  young  wheat 
and  beans,  had  no  objection  to  your  riding  over  their 
fields.  This  will  hardly  continue.  Fox-hunting  will 
share  the  general  change.  Already  it  has  become  rather 
artificial,  and  more  like  a  steeplechase  than  a  hunt, 
little  notice  being  taken  of  the  working  of  the  hounds, 
which  had  been  the  great  point  with  the  fox-hunters 
of  old.  However,  it  gave  me  some  merry  days,  and 
an  addition  to  my  rather  scanty  stock  of  health.  As 
Freeman,3  the  scourge  of  fox-hunters,  is  gone,  I  may 
venture  to  say  that  few  pleasures  can  equal  a  good  run. 
To  shooting  I  did  not  so  much  take.  If  I  enjoyed  a 
season  in  the  Highlands,  it  was  more  for  the  air,  the 
scenery,  the  heather,  and  the  lunch  when  the  ladies 
came  out  to  meet  us  by  the  burn's  side,  than  for  the 
grouse.  Not  in  Scotland,  but  in  America,  I  once  shot 

t1  Bishop  of  Manchester  from  1870  till  his  death  in  1885.  Born 
in  1818.] 

[2  Charles  Kingsley,  Canon  of  Westminster,  author  of  "Alton 
Locke,"  "Westward  Ho  !  "  etc.] 

[3  Professor  E.  A.  Freeman,  the  historian  of  the  Norman  Con- 
quest.] 


MORTIMER  21 

a  deer.  I  did  not  kill  it  and  they  had  to  cut  its  throat. 
I  shall  never  forget  the  pitiful  look  of  its  soft  eyes. 
Never  would  I  have  shot  at  another  deer. 

Not  being  a  smoker  —  for  they  would  not  let  us 
smoke  at  Eton  and  nobody  smoked  in  my  College  — 
I  have  often  wondered  in  what  the  pleasure  of  smoking 
consists.  Is  it  an  anodyne  for  the  overwrought  brain  ? 
Whenever  there  was  a  long  check,  out  came  the  cigars. 
But  those  brains  were  not  overwrought. 

We  were  in  the  next  parish  to  Strathfieldsaye,  the 
country-seat  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington.  The  old 
Duke  performed  all  the  duties  of  life,  and  among  them, 
when  he  could,  that  of  country  gentleman.  When  his 
work  in  town  permitted,  he  came  down,  called  on  his 
neighbours,  entertained  them,  and  showed  himself  to 
his  people.  I  turned  up  one  of  his  ample  visiting-cards 
with  his  "F.M."  the  other  day.  There  was  a  farm 
which  ran  into  his  estate  and  which  he  wished  to  buy ; 
but  it  was  held  at  too  high  a  price.  One  day  on  his 
arrival  at  Strathfieldsaye  he  was  greeted  by  his  bailiff 
with  the  glad  tidings  that  the  owner  of  the  farm  was 
in  difficulties  and  was  forced  to  sell  at  a  low  price. 
"I  don't  want  to  take  advantage  of  any  man's  diffi-U\ 
culties,"  he  replied;  "go  and  give  him  the  fair  price 
for  his  land."  He  rode  with  hounds,  but  had  a  loose 
military  seat,  and  was  sometimes  thrown.  He  did 
not  like  this  to  be  noticed,  and  was  far  from  pleased 
when  a  farmer  said  to  him,  "I  see  your  Grace  often 
parted  from  your  saddle.  Ye  should  tak  oop  your 


22  REMINISCENCES 

stirrups  and  ride  as  I  do."  He  was  tenacious  of  his 
character  as  sportsman,  and  was  greatly  hurt  when, 
on  account  of  his  age,  he  ceased  to  be  invited  to  the 
Prince  Consort's  shooting  parties.  He  kept  a  hunting 
stud  to  the  last,  though  he  could  ride  no  farther  than 
the  cover-side.  He  had  not  much  taste,  and  when  a 
Roman  villa  was  opened  on  his  estate  and  drew  visitors 
he  had  it  covered  up,  saying  that  if  people  wanted  to 
see  curiosities  they  must  go  to  Italy.  The  Church  at 
Strathfieldsaye  was  in  the  park  and  was  an  uneccle- 
siastical  structure  in  a  cruciform  shape,  with  a  cupola, 
bespeaking  the  fantastic  taste  of  the  last  Lord  of 
Strathfieldsaye.  Gerald  Wellesley,  the  Duke's  nephew, 
who  was  Rector  of  Strathfieldsaye,  had  often  begged 
the  Duke  in  vain  to  build  something  more  like  a  Church. 
One  day,  however,  the  Duke  said,  "Gerald,  I  begin  to 
think  you  are  right.  That  building  is  not  like  a  Church. 
I'll  tell  you  what  I'll  do  ;  I'll  put  a  steeple  on  it."  The 
last  time  I  saw  the  Duke  was  at  the  door  of  that  Church. 
He  was  told  that  one  of  his  old  generals  had  just  died. 
He  looked  grave  for  a  moment  as  if  he  felt  it  to  be  a 
warning.  Then  he  said,  "He  was  a  very  old  man, 
though";  put  his  arm  in  that  of  Lady  Douro;  and 
trudged  sturdily  away.  The  Duke  was  cold  and 
aristocratic,  or  rather  undemocratic,  for  he  did  not  think 
much  of  titular  rank.  His  soldiers  trusted  rather  than 
loved  him.  He  took  too  little  thought  for  their  claims 
or  for  their  comfort,  and  spoke  of  them  with  too  little 
feeling.  But  he  was  a  noble  model  of  simple  devotion 

tJ  C  <* 


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MORTIMER  23 

to  duty,  perfectly  free  from  vanity,  at  least  while  his 
mind  remained  unimpaired.  A  worshipper,  it  was  said, 
went  up  to  him  and  begged  to  be  allowed  to  take  the 
hand  of  the  victor  of  Waterloo.  "Don't  make  a 
damned  fool  of  yourself,"  was  the  hero's  reply. 

The  second  Duke  I  knew  well,  and  was  his  guest  at 
Strathfieldsaye.  He  had  something  of  his  father's 
features,  though  without  the  forehead,  and  a  spark  of 
the  intellect,  but  nothing  of  the  character.  He  was 
a  mere  sybarite.  He  was  married  to  a  beautiful  woman, 
and  neglected  her.  It  was  said  that  when  she  com- 
plained to  the  old  Duke,  who  was  very  fond  of  her, 
the  answer  was,  "My  dear,  the  Wellesleys  have  always 
been  bad  husbands."  Of  the  history  of  the  old  Duke's 
marriage  there  were  different  versions,  but  no  version 
was  happy.  The  common  one  was  that  he  had  formed 
the  engagement  when  the  lady  was  in  her  beauty  and 
had  kept  it  as  a  point  of  honour  when  she  was  pitted 
with  smallpox.  This  certainly  was  not  true.  The 
fact,  I  believe,  was  that  she  rejected  him;  that  he 
went  abroad,  and  on  his  return,  when  his  love  had 
cooled,  was  persuaded  by  a  friend  of  the  lady  to  offer 
himself  again.  But  Wellington,  the  soul  of  duty,  was 
not  warm-hearted,  or  likely  to  be  a  very  loving  mate. 

Punctual  in  the  performance  of  all  the  duties  of  life, 
the  old  Duke  of  Strathfieldsaye  went  regularly  to 
Church.  He  had  a  gallery  to  himself,  with  a  firepla.ee, 
the  fire  in  which,  growing  deaf,  he  was  apt  to  poke 
rather  loud. 


24  REMINISCENCES 

In  a  paddock  at  Strathfieldsaye,  "  Copenhagen," 
Wellington's  charger  at  Waterloo,  ended  his  days.  "A 
low-shouldered  brute,"  the  second  Duke  irreverently 
called  him  to  my  father.  He  was  a  half  Arab,  and  the 
breed,  I  believe,  is  apt  to  be  low  in  the  shoulder.  The 
formation,  I  fancied,  was  perceptible  in  the  Equestrian 
Statue  which  stood  over  the  arch  on  Constitution  Hill, 
and  which,  grotesque  as  its  position  was,  the  old  Duke 
did  not  like  to  have  removed. 

The  second  Duke  showed  me  a  collection  of  likenesses 
of  Napoleon;  I  told  him  there  was  one  he  had  not; 
a  bust  taken  at  the  time  of  the  Egyptian  expedition, 
differing  from  the  rest,  as  I  thought,  by  showing  some- 
thing more  of  enthusiasm  and  less  of  the  hard  look  of 
settled  ambition.  It  was  in  possession  of  Jerome 
Bonaparte  at  Baltimore.  The  Duke  asked  me  when 
I  returned  to  America  to  get  him  a  photograph.  The 
first  attempt  was  a  failure.  But  afterwards  Jerome 
showed  himself  a  genuine  Bonaparte  by  the  develop- 
ment of  a  cancerous  tumour,  of  which  he  died.  A 
photograph  of  the  tumour  was  taken  for  submission  to 
physicians  at  Paris.  The  photographer  then  got  a  good 
impression  of  the  bust,  which  I  suppose  is  still  at  Strath- 
fieldsaye. 

It  was  difficult  to  find  any  one  who  had  seen  Napo- 
leon. I  made  that  remark  at  a  dinner  party,  when  a 
voice  near  me  said,  "I  saw  Napoleon."  It  was  Lord 
Russell,1  who  had  paid  Napoleon  a  visit  at  Elba,  ac- 

[l  Lord  John  Russell,  first  Earl  Russell.] 


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MORTIMER  25 

counts  of  which  are  already  in  print.  I  asked  Lord 
Russell  whether  the  common  portraits  were  like.  He 
said  they  were.  I  asked  him  whether  there  was  not 
in  the  face  that  hard  look  of  selfish  ambition.  This  he 
had  not  noticed;  but  he  said,  and  repeated  with  em- 
phasis, that  there  was  something  very  evil  in  the  eye. 
When  Lord  Russell  spoke  of  war,  Napoleon's  eye  flashed, 
showing,  what  was  certainly  the  fact,  that  the  lust  of 
war  was  with  him  in  itself  a  ruling  passion.  It  is  diffi- 
cult to  divine  what  else  could  have  led  him  to  invade 
Russia.  He  evidently  had  no  intention  of  restoring 
Poland.  He  was  immensely  fat,  Lord  Russell  said,  and 
this  might  account  for  his  fatal  lack  of  activity  in  his 
last  campaign. 

Guizot  told  me  that  he  had  seen  Napoleon  at  a  win- 
dow in  the  Tuileries.  Brougham  used  to  tell  an  anec- 
dote of  him  which  he  said  he  had  at  first  hand.  In  his 
flight  from  Waterloo  he  showed  his  depression.  The 
member  of  his  staff  who  was  riding  by  his  side  thought 
he  might  be  sorrowing  over  his  loss  of  so  many  old 
companions-in-arms,  and  tried  to  comfort  him  by  saying 
that  Wellington  also  must  have  lost  many  old  com- 
panions-in-arms. "He  has  not  lost  the  battle,"  was 
the  only  reply. 

At  Three-Mile-Cross,  not  far  off,  dwelt  Miss  Mitford,1 
the  authoress  whose  "Belford  Regis,"  portraying  under 
feigned  names  the  characters  of  Reading,  amused  in 

[l  Mary  Russell  Mitford,  author  of  ."Our  Village,"  etc.  1707- 
1855.1 


26  REMINISCENCES 

its  day.  She  had  won  a  large  sum  in  a  lottery.  It 
was  squandered  by  a  worthless  father,  to  whom  she 
remained  a  most  devoted  daughter.  Her  great  friend 
and  literary  ally  was  Talfourd,1  whose  "Ion,"  though 
now  forgotten,  is  not  without  classical  merit. 

Another  notable  neighbour  at  Mortimer  was  Sir 
Henry  Russell 2  of  Swallowfield,  a  retired  Anglo-Indian 
of  distinction  who  had  long  been  the  Resident  at  Hyder- 
abad. He  was  a  fine  specimen  of  the  old  Anglo-Indian 
school.  It  being  in  his  days  a  six  months'  voyage  from 
England  to  India,  he  had  passed  his  life  in  Hindostan 
and  had  learned  to  identify  himself  with  the  people. 
No  such  word  as  "Nigger"  ever  passed  his  lips.  He 
seemed  to  regard  a  Hindoo  gentleman  as  his  equal, 
though  of  a  different  race  and  religion.  Missionaries 
he  abhorred.  "No  gentleman,"  he  said,  "ever  changed 
his  politics  or  his  religion."  He  was  a  man  of  refined 
tastes,  a  good  writer,  and  a  model  of  urbanity.  When 
he  was  dying  his  medical  man  pressed  on  him  a  useless 
draught,  telling  him  it  would  do  him  good.  "I  am  sure 
it  will,"  he  said,  "if  it  comes  from  your  hand."  He 
had  brought  away  from  India  a  healthy  frame,  as  he 
said  anyone  might  who  would  be  temperate  and  careful. 
He  was  an  active  local  improver  and  a  practical  pioneer 
of  the  reform  of  the  Poor  Law. 

At  Bearwood,  not  far  off,  lived  the  mortal  enemy  of 

t1  Sir  Thomas  Noon  Talfourd,  judge  and  author,  M.P.  for  Reading, 
1835,  1837,  and  1841.  Born  in  1795,  died  in  1854.] 

[2  Sir  Henry  Russell,  second  Baronet,  eldest  son  of  Sir  Henry 
Russell,  the  first  Baronet.  Born  1783 ;  died  1852.] 


MORTIMER  27 

the  new  Poor  Law,  John  Walter/  of  The  Times.  The 
mighty  Radical,  as  he  then  was,  had  pitched  his  tent 
among  Tory  Squires,  to  whom  his  name  was  a  terror 
and  with  whom  he  for  some  time  lived  at  war.  He 
had  a  very  strong  temper,  was  firm  in  friendship,  and 
inflexible  in  hate.  When  he  was  rebuked  for  the  ran- 
cour with  which  he  assailed  a  public  man  who  bethought 
had  betrayed  him,  and  reminded  that  the  Bible  told 
you  to  forgive  your  enemies,  his  answer  was,  "  Yes ;  but 
it  doesn't  tell  you  to  forgive  your  friends."  My  father 
was  in  treaty  for  the  purchase  of  a  house  which  had  a 
road  running  too  near  it.  Application  had  been  made 
at  Quarter  Sessions  for  permission  to  turn  the  road. 
The  vendor  happened  to  be  a  particular  enemy  of 
Walter.  Time  after  time  Walter  came  with  the  only 
two  local  allies  which  he  had  to  Quarter  Sessions,  and 
opposed  the  turning  of  the  road.  My  father,  happening 
to  meet  him,  asked  him  what  could  be  the  motive  of 
his  opposition.  It  turned  out  that  he  had  fancied  that 
the  turning  of  the  road  was  a  condition  of  the  purchase 
and  that  the  sale  was  hung  up  on  that  account.  Learn- 
ing that  he  was  mistaken,  he  ceased  to  oppose  the  turn- 
ing of  the  road. 

In  Mortimer  lived  Sir  John  Mowbray,2  the  high  Tory 

[l  This  was  the  third  John  Walter  of  The  Times.  He  was  M.P. 
for  Nottingham  and  for  Berkshire.  Born  1818 ;  died  1894.] 

[2The  Right  Honourable  Sir  John  Robert  Mowbray,  the  first 
Baronet,  was  the  only  son  of  Robert  Stribling  Cornish,  of  Exeter.  He 
assumed  the  surname  of  Mowbray  upon  his  marriage.  Born  in  1815 ; 
died  1899.] 


28  REMINISCENCES 

member  for  the  University  of  Oxford.  His  high  Tory- 
ism did  not  interfere  with  our  friendship,  which  was 
kept  up  by  correspondence  when  I  had  left  England. 
The  value  of  the  English  rule  which  forbids  politics 
to  interfere  with  social  relations  is  felt  when  one's 
lot  is  cast  where  that  rule  does  not  prevail  and  people 
feel  at  liberty  to  indulge  their  personal  propensities 
under  cover  of  political  opinion.  Mowbray  was  very 
interesting,  for  he  was  an  epitome  of  the  House  of 
Commons. 

We  had  visitors  at  Mortimer ;  one  of  them  was  Admi- 
ral, afterwards  Lord,  Lyons,1  a  man  of  keen  intelli- 
gence and  thorough  knowledge  of  the  world,  as  well  as  a 
great  naval  commander.  He  had  been  Ambassador  2  at 
Athens,  and  told  some  good  stories  of  those  days. 
There  was  to  be  a  Court  Ball.  A  British  Consul  and 
his  family  came  to  Athens  for  it.  Lyons  lunched  with 
them  on  the  day.  A  little  boy  asked  for  something  on 
the  table.  Being  refused,  he  asked  for  it  again,  threat- 
ening to  tell  if  they  would  not  give  it  to  him.  Again 
they  refused.  He  flourished  his  spoon,  and  shouted, 
"Grandmamma's  dead."  It  had  been  agreed  to  keep 
the  old  lady's  demise  quiet  till  after  the  Ball.  Lyons 
gave  a  diplomatic  dinner  to  propitiate  an  offended 
Oriental.  There  was  an  iced  pudding,  which  being 
taken  to  the  guest  of  honour  first,  he,  seeing  something 

[x  Edmund  Lyons,  first  Baron  Lyons  of  Christchurch.  Born 
1890 ;  died  in  1858.] 

[2  "Minister  Plenipotentiary,"  I  think  this  should  be.] 


MORTIMER  29 

unctuous,  helped  himself  to  it  and  put  a  large  piece  in 
his  mouth.  He  jumped  up,  furious,  spluttering,  and 
rushed  out  of  the  room.  Lyons  followed  him  and  found 
him  implacable.  His  mouth  was  burnt;  it  was  an 
abominable  trick ;  else  why  had  the  pudding  been  taken 
to  him  first?  He  went  away  unappeased,  and  diplo- 
macy missed  its  mark. 

Other  visitors  were  Sir  Roderick  and  Lady  Murchi- 
son.1  Sir  Roderick  was  a  cavalry  officer  who  had  taken 
to  science,  and  being  rich  became  its  Amphitryon. 
Lady  Murchison  was  very  bright.  She  and  I  went  to 
see  Maple  Durham,  a  fine  Elizabethan  house  near  Read- 
ing. Across  the  grounds  there  was  a  public  path  from 
which  there  was  a  good  view  of  the  mansion,  to  the  lord 
of  which  the  path,  trenching  on  his  privacy,  was  an 
eyesore.  We  were  standing  on  this  path  to  look  at 
the  house  when  a  servant  came  up  and  said,  "  Strangers 
are  not  allowed  to  stand  here."  "Are  they  not?"  said 
Lady  Murchison;  "then  will  you  kindly  fetch  me  a 
chair."  Sir  Roderick  had  been  invited  by  the  Czar 
Nicholas  to  survey  the  mining  region  of  the  Urals. 
He  became  intimate  with  the  Czar,  and  testified,  there 
is  no  doubt  truly,  to  the  Czar's  perfect  good  will  to 
England. 

I  cannot  help  mentioning  my  father's  household  as 
almost  a  relic  of  old  times.  It  was  a  household  in  the 


1  Sir  Roderick  Impey  Murchison,  first  Baronet.  He  published 
"The  Silurian  System"  in  1838.  Director  General  of  the  Geologi- 
cal Survey  in  1855.  Born  in  1792 ;  died  1871.] 


30  REMINISCENCES 

true  sense  of  the  term.  In  it  were  five  upper  servants 
whose  united  terms  of  service  with  my  father,  my  step- 
mother, or  both,  were  two  hundred  and  thirty  years. 
They  thoroughly  identified  themselves  with  the  family 
and  its  interests,  and  when  the  household  was  broken 
up,  took  their  pensions,  and  went  into  no  other  service. 
I  am  afraid  they  were  not  highly  educated;  I  doubt 
whether  they  could  have  produced  a  grammatical 
letter  among  them.  The  old  coachman,  who  had  been 
with  my  father  more  than  fifty  years,  could  neither 
read  nor  write.  He  was  excellent  in  his  calling,  and 
not  without  refinement  of  feeling.  When  his  mistress 
was  dying,  he  sent  her  up  a  rose  as  his  farewell.  Grow- 
ing very  old,  he  had  a  fit  upon  the  box.  They  wanted 
him  to  give  up  the  reins,  promising  him  as  a  pension 
his  full  wages  and  his  house.  But  he  said  that  if  he 
ceased  to  drive  the  family  he  would  die;  the  medical 
man  said  he  believed  he  would.  The  master  and 
mistress  seldom  left  home,  and  treated  the  domestics 
not  as  servants,  but  as  members  of  a  household.  House- 
holds are  hardly  possible  now;  in  America  it  seems 
almost  unexampled. 

Who  now  lives  in  the  old  house,  thinking  nothing 
of  its  former  inmates  ?  Who  strolls  beneath  those  elms 
in  the  summer  evening,  and  looks  over  the  lawn  to  the 
farm  on  the  hill  which  marks  the  site  of  the  Plantagenet 
hunting-seat?  Whose  is  now  the  room  from  the  win- 
dow of  which,  rising  to  my  early  studies,  I  used  to  see 
the  moon  and  the  morning  star  together  in  the  sky? 


MORTIMER  31 

If  you  wish  to  give  yourself  a  fit  of  the  blues,  you  can- 
not do  better  than  think  of  the  haunts  of  your  youth 
and  call  up  the  forms  once  familiar  which  have  long 
since  become  dust. 


CHAPTER  III 

SCHOOL 
1831-1840 

School  —  School-life  —  Eton  —  Dr.  Goodall,  the  Provost— The 
Head  Master,  Hawtrey  —  William  IV  —  Queen  Victoria  — 
Schoolmates. 

To  return  to  Friar  Street,  Reading,  and  the  little 
boy.  At  eight  years  old  I  was  sent,  as  the  custom 
then  was,  to  a  boarding  school.  Being  sickly,  I  was 
sent  to  one  on  the  Downs,  near  Bath,  for  the  sake  of 
the  air.  The  air  did  me  good ;  so  perhaps  did  the  idle- 
ness. The  master  was  an  ex-Lieutenant  of  Marines 
who  had  taken  Orders.  He  knew  little,  and  did  not 
attempt  to  teach  us  much.  School  was  over  at  one. 
After  dinner  we  went  to  the  playing-field  or  were  taken 
to  the  Downs,  where  we  collected  fossils,  butterflies, 
and  plants.  My  little  brain  rested,  my  health  im- 
proved; perhaps  I  owe  it  to  those  fallow  years  that, 
having  set  out  with  a  very  weak  constitution,  I  am  able 
to  do  some  work  at  eighty-four.  I  sometimes  say 
that  if  I  have  outlived  four  successors  in  my  Chair  of 
History  at  Oxford,  I  owe  it  to  having  been  at  two  idle 
schools,  as  both  Monkton  Farley  and  Eton  were. 
Speaking  seriously,  are  not  the  brains  of  children 

32 


SCHOOL  33 

overworked  ?  I  suffered,  however,  from  want  of  early 
grounding. 

Though  the  school  was  expensive,  our  fare  was  such 
as  any  English  boy,  still  more  any  American  boy,  at 
the  present  day  would  regard  with  disgust.  For  break- 
fast we  had  three  squares  of  bread  and  butter  and  a 
mug  of  tea.  For  dinner  we  had  one  helping  of  meat 
and  one  of  pudding.  The  supper  was  the  same  as  the 
breakfast.  However,  in  five  years  I  never  was  in  bed 
for  sickness,  nor  do  I  remember  that  any  one  of  my 
schoolmates  was. 

The  custom  of  sending  children  to  boarding-schools 
was,  however,  rather  cruel.  The  child  had  not  a  little 
to  suffer  by  severance  from  his  home ;  his  home  affec- 
tions were  deadened;  he  was  early  familiarized  and 
too  often  indoctrinated  with  evil.  A  boarding-school 
is  seldom  free  from  bullying,  which  makes  strong  boys 
tyrants  and  weak  boys  cowards.  An  experienced 
Oxford  tutor  said  that  his  best  pupils  came  from  home 
with  a  good  day-school ;  the  next  best  from  the  great 
public  schools;  those  of  the  third  grade  from  private 
boarding-schools ;  and  the  worst  of  all  from  the  private 
tutors.  It  is  just  to  the  private  tutors  to  say  that  to 
them  the  desperate  cases  were  generally  turned  over 
from  the  public  schools.  The  home  as  well  as  the  day- 
school  must  be  good. 

The  names  and  faces  of  my  schoolmates  at  Monkton 
Farley  are  as  fresh  in  my  memory  as  if  I  had  just  left 
the  school;  while  I  forget  the  names  and  faces  of 


34  REMINISCENCES 

people  to  whom  I  was  introduced  yesterday.  What  is 
memory?  What  is  it  that  stores  up  these  myriads  of 
impressions  and  retains  them  for  seventy  years  ?  It  is 
of  course  something  physical,  since  the  receptive  or 
retentive  power  of  the  retina  is  diminished,  as  I  know 
too  well,  by  old  age.  The  connections  are  not  less 
mysterious  than  the  retention.  I  was  travelling  the 
other  day  in  a  railway  carriage,  when  suddenly  there 
occurred  to  my  mind  the  name  Heydukoff*  With  great 
difficulty,  after  some  time,  I  recollected  that  it  was  the 
name  of  a  hotel  at  Dresden  where  I  had  once  dined  in 
1847  to  taste  a  particular  dish.  Nothing  had  happened 
since  to  recall  the  incident  to  my  mind ;  nor  was  there 
anything  in  the  surroundings  to  suggest  it.  Here  is 
one  riddle  for  physiology  still  to  solve.  Another,  per- 
haps, is  the  spontaneous  action  of  the  imagination  in 
sleep,  originating  scenes  and  incidents  which  have  had 
no  counterpart  in  our  waking  life.  But  this  by  the 
way. 

Still  there  is  a  glamour  over  the  memories  of  our 
school  days.  Forty  years  after  leaving  Monkton 
Farley  I  was  standing  in  a  crowd  at  Dublin  when  I 
was  touched  upon  the  shoulder,  and,  turning  round, 
was  accosted  by  one  of  my  schoolmates  whom  I  had  not 
seen  or  heard  of  since  we  parted  at  Monkton  Farley 
school.  I  think  I  never  enjoyed  an  evening  more  than 


P  H.  Heydukoff  was  a  "Restaurateur"  in  Dresden  at  Frauen- 
strasse  12  (Palace  of  Cosel)  in  1848;  at  Frauengasse  10  in  1849; 
and  at  Liittiehaustrasse  23,  part,  in  1850  and  1851.] 


SCHOOL  35 

the  one  which,  after  our  mutual  recognition,  I  spent 
with  him  at  his  house. 

From  a  private  school  I  went  to  Eton,  trembling, 
for  I  was  still  far  from  strong  and  did  not  know  what  I 
might  have  to  encounter  in  a  great  public  school. 
My  fears  were  at  once  dispelled.  Fagging  was  merely 
one  of  the  antiquities  of  the  place,  a  remnant  of  the 
days  when  the  young  used  to  wait  upon  their  elders, 
when  the  page  of  noble  birth  served  for  the  company 
in  hall.  In  my  time  hardly  anything  remained  of  it 
but  the  custom  of  laying  for  an  upper  boy  his  breakfast 
and  tea  things,  in  return  for  which  he  owed  you  his 
advice  and  protection.  Bullying  I  neither  encountered 
nor  witnessed.  Bullying  was  mean,  and  Eton  boys 
were  gentlemen;  I  enjoyed  perfect  freedom;  played  at 
games  or  not  as  I  chose ;  and  "sapped,"  that  is  studied, 
when  I  took  to  it,  without  the  slightest  molestation. 
Perhaps  if  by  sapping  I  had  forced  others  to  sap,  I  might 
not  have  been  so  free  from  molestation. 

A  curious  institution  was  the  unreformed  Eton  of 
those  days.  Nothing  was  taught  but  classics;  even 
mathematics  were  not  part  of  the  school  course,  nor 
was  the  mathematical  master  a  member  of  the  staff. 
It  was  said  that  when  a  mathematical  teacher  was 
appointed  he  asked  the  Provost  whether  he  was,  like 
the  other  masters,  to  wear  a  gown.  "That  is  as  you 
please."  "Are  the  boys  to  take  off  their  hats  to  me ?  " 
"That  is  as  they  please."  Our  lessons  were,  as  they 
had  probably  been  for  centuries,  thirty  lines,  neither 


36  REMINISCENCES 

more  nor  less,  of  Homer,  Virgil,  Horace,  Poetae  Graeci, 
or  Scriptores  Romani.  In  the  sixth  form  we  read  a 
Greek  play.  The  thing  most  prized  was  Latin  com- 
position, especially  in  verse.  If  you  wrote  a  good  set 
of  verses,  they  were  sent  to  the  Provost,  the  Head 
Master  read  them  out  to  the  class,  and  an  asterisk  was 
put  after  your  name  in  the  school  list.  This  would 
now  be  deemed  waste  of  time.  For  most  of  the  boys 
it  was  so  then ;  the  few  became  very  familiar  with  the 
Latin  poets  and  acquired  form  in  composition.  A 
great  London  editor  told  me  that  the  only  members 
of  his  staff  who  wrote  in  good  form  from  the  beginning 
had  practised  Latin  verse.  Exercises  were  done  out 
of  school,  and  there  was  no  scruple  about  getting  them 
done  for  you  or  using  old  copies.  On  my  arrival  I 
was  offered  by  the  servant  of  the  boarding-house  a  col- 
lection of  old  copies,  indexed,  so  that  you  might  be 
pretty  sure  of  finding  something  available  when  the 
subject  for  themes  or  verses  had  been  given  out  in 
school. 

There  were  one  regular  whole  holiday  and  one  half 
holiday  in  every  week.  Saints'  days  were  also  holi- 
days. You  were  never  in  school  more  than  three- 
quarters  of  an  hour  at  a  time.  In  morning-school  you 
said  by  heart  the  Greek  or  Latin  poetry  which  you  had 
read  in  class.  This  was  about  the  hardest  part  of  the 
work,  which,  as  a  whole,  was  really  little  more  than  a 
formality. 

To  wider  and  more  serious  study  of  the  classics, 


SCHOOL  37 

however,  we  were  spurred  in  the  higher  part  of  the 
school  by  annual  competition  for  the  Newcastle  Scholar- 
ship and  medal,  founded  by  the  famous  old  anti-reform 
Duke,1  who,  when  taxed  with  coercion  of  his  tenants 
in  elections,  asked  whether  he  had  not  a  right  to  do  as 
he  pleased  with  his  own.  Through  an  oversight  on 
the  part  of  the  Trustees  the  medal  was  not  struck  for 
forty  years.  When  the  oversight  was  discovered,  and 
the  winners,  myself  one  of  them,  were  hunted  up,  it 
was  seen  how  wide  had  been  the  divergence  of  the  paths 
in  life  of  those  whose  starting-place  had  been  the  same. 
One  of  them  had  turned  Jesuit,  and  by  the  rule  of  his 
Order  was  incapable  of  holding  property  in  his  medal. 
Not  a  few  received  their  mark  of  classical  distinction 
on  the  other  side  of  the  Styx.  When  one  has  lived 
long,  it  is  curious  to  look  back  to  the  beginnings  of  so 
many  careers  and  compare  the  expectations  formed 
of  them  with  the  careers  and  their  close. 

Many  of  the  boys  in  those  days  were  not  destined 
for  the  University.  Many  went  into  the  army,  espe- 
cially into  the  Guards  or  the  Light  Cavalry  regiments, 
the  diplomatic  service,  the  Royal  Household,  and  the 
other  pleasant  pastures  of  aristocracy  before  competi- 
tion. They  still  got  commissions  in  the  army  young, 
though  not  so  young  as  they  once  had.  I  have  seen  a 
letter  written  by  an  Eton  boy,  one  of  the  Bathursts, 
who  had  got  his  commission  at  fourteen  and  gone 

[J  Henry  Pelham  Fiennes  Pelham  Clinton,  fourth  Duke  of  New- 
castle; 1785-1851.] 


38  REMINISCENCES 

straight  to  Waterloo.  It  ran:  " Dear  Mamma :  Cousin 
Tom  and  I  are  all  right.  I  never  saw  anything  like  it 
in  my  life."  Eton  in  those  days  was  altogether  very 
much  wrapped  up  in  herself,  and  thought  less  than  she 
probably  does  now  of  University  honours.  My  brother 
Arthur,  who  went  with  me  to  Eton,  was  destined  for 
the  army.  I  was  myself  nearly  going  into  the  Indian 
Civil  Service. 

Outside  of  the  school  course,  however,  there  was  in 
that  little  commonwealth  a  good  deal  of  intellectual 
activity.  Many  of  the  boys  came  from  political  homes 
and  took  a  lively  interest  in  public  questions.  "Pop," 
as  the  Debating  Society,  from  being  held  over  a  ginger- 
beer  shop,  was  called,  was  very  vivacious,  and  bred 
orators,  Gladstone  among  the  number;  though  that 
great  man's  eloquence  lost  by  practice  in  debating 
clubs  at  Eton  and  Oxford  in  freshness  of  style  part  of 
what  it  gained  in  fluency. 

Eton  conservatism  was  grotesque.  The  nominal 
" bounds"  of  former  days  were  preserved.  In  reality 
it  was  understood  that  there  were  no  bounds  and  that 
between  school  hours,  until  " lock-up,"  you  might  go 
where  you  pleased,  only  that  if  you  met  a  master  out- 
side the  nominal  bounds  you  had  to  " shirk,"  that  is, 
to  make  a  show  of  keeping  out  of  sight,  while  he  was 
bound  in  courtesy  not  to  see  you.  The  river  was  out 
of  bounds,  though  not  only  was  boating  the  regular 
and  recognized  amusement,  but  we  were  all  required 
to  learn  to  swim.  On  Sunday  afternoon  the  Castle 


SCHOOL  39 

Terrace,  where  the  King 1  showed  himself  and  the 
band  played,  was  in  bounds,  while  the  way  to  it  was 
out  of  bounds.  Eton  rowed  against  Westminster  at 
Datchet.  The  match  was  on  a  Saint's  day  after  after- 
noon chapel.  There  was  barely  time  for  it  between 
the  chapel  and  the  evening  calling-over  —  "absence," 
as  it  was  curiously  called.  But  to  put  off  the  calling- 
over  for  an  hour  would  have  been  a  disturbance  of 
the  spheres.  So  in  chapel  the  reader  rushed  through 
the  service;  the  choristers,  for  an  anthem,  sang  three 
Hallelujahs;  while  the  Head  Master  sat  in  his  stall, 
looking  perfectly  unconscious  that  anything  unusual 
was  at  hand. 

Games  were  still  games  when  Waterloo  was  won  on 
the  playing-fields  at  Eton.  "Athletics,"  with  all  their 
paraphernalia,  were  still  in  the  womb  of  time.  An 
Eton  boy  would  have  stared  if  you  had  spoken  to  him 
of  gate-money.  Nor  was  anybody  killed  or  maimed 
at  football. 

The  College,  that  is,  the  Foundation,  is  now,  since 
the  admission  has  been  by  merit,  the  pick  of  the  school. 
In  those  days  it  was  in  a  low  state,  the  nominations 
being  used  by  the  Provost  and  Fellows  as  mere  patron- 
age. The  Collegers  were  "Tugs,"  disrated  by  the 
Oppidans,  pigging  in  a  vast  and  murky  den  called  Long 
Chamber,  wearing  stuff  gowns,  and  not  allowed  to  come 
on  the  Oppidan's  part  of  the  river.  They  went  off  by 
seniority  to  Fellowships  at  King's  College,  Cambridge, 

I1  William  IV.] 


40  REMINISCENCES 

and  from  the  Fellows  at  King's,  in  deference  to  an  evil 
tradition,  all  the  Eton  masters  were  taken.  The 
ablest  of  the  Fellows  went  off  to  professions,  and  the 
school  got  what  was  left.  Some  of  our  masters  were 
very  incompetent.  I  was  for  two  years  in  class  under 
one  who,  though  he  was  a  good  old  soul  and  I  love  his 
memory,  knew  no  more  than  I  did.  They  have  hap- 
pily changed  all  that.  The  Foundation  has  been 
thoroughly  reformed.  It  has  been  provided  with  better 
lodgings  than  "Long  Chamber";  the  appointments  to 
it  are  made  by  examination;  and  there  even  seems  to 
be  a  danger  of  its  absorbing  too  much  of  the  best  intel- 
lect of  the  school  and  leaving  the  dough  without  the 
leaven. 

There  was  one  master  who  had  not  been  a  Fellow 
of  King's,  but  having  married  the  daughter  of  the  Head 
Master,  Keate,1  had  been  brought  in  first  to  fill  a  gap, 
and  then  permanently  retained,  though  not  without 
discreditable  manifestations  of  jealousy  on  the  part 
of  some  of  his  colleagues.  Edward  Coleridge 2  was 
nephew  of  the  poet  and  philosopher,  brother  of  the 
judge,  uncle  of  the  Lord  Chief  Justice.  I  had  the  good 
fortune  to  be  his  pupil  and  board  in  his  house.  A 
deep  scholar  he  was  not ;  but  he  was  a  maker  of  schol- 

f1  John  Keate,  head  master  of  Eton  from  1809-1834.  Born 
1773 ;  died  1852.] 

[2  Son  of  James  Coleridge,  of  Tiverton,  Devon ;  born  in  1801  ; 
Fellow  of  Exeter  College,  Oxford,  1823-1826  ;  Assistant  Master  at 
Eton,  1824-1850  ;  Lower  Master,  1850-1857  ;  Fellow,  1857  ;  Vicar 
of  Maple  Durham,  Berks,  1862  until  his  death  on  the  18th  of  May, 
1883.  —  Alumni  Oxonienses,  s.v.] 


SCHOOL  41 

ars.  He  inspired  where  he  could  not  instruct.  He 
loved  his  pupil-room,  and  gave  himself  with  his  whole 
heart  to  its  service.  His  pupils  requited  his  affection, 
and  to  have  been  "in  my  tutor's  house  "  has  always 
been  among  them  a  cherished  memory  and  a  bond. 
Coleridge  was  the  Arnold  of  Eton,  so  far  as  Eton  could 
have  an  Arnold,  and  there  was  sympathy  between  him 
and  the  Arnold  of  Rugby. 

Twice  every  Sunday,  twice  every  holiday  or  Saint's 
day,  and  on  every  Saturday  afternoon,  to  kindle  the 
flame  of  piety  in  our  souls,  we  were  mustered  at  choral 
service  in  the  College  Chapel.  Only  on  Sunday  did 
we  take  Prayer-Books  or  even  affect  to  join  in  the 
service.  Our  attendance  on  other  days  was  a  mere 
roll-call,  two  or  three  masters  attending  to  keep  order 
and  prevent  our  talking  too  loud  or  too  visibly  munch- 
ing candies.  On  Sundays  the  Fellows,  who  were  super- 
annuated masters,  preached,  and  the  sermons  of  some 
of  them  were  not  only  platitudinous,  but  grotesque. 
Old  Plumptre  l  was  incomparable.  He  had  a  Puri- 
tanic habit  of  putting  everything  into  Scripture  lan- 
guage. When  Owen  the  Socialist  had,  to  Plumptre 's 
horror,  been  introduced  by  Lord  Melbourne  at  Court, 
he  had  "made  Blastus,  the  King's  Chamberlain, 
his  friend."  Audible  laughter  would  go  round  the 
juvenile  congregation,  and  I  have  seen  the  Masters 

t1  Frederick  Charles  Plumptre,  Fellow  of  University  College, 
Oxford,  from  1817  to  1836 ;  Tutor  in  1820 ;  Dean  and  Bursar  in  1821  ; 
Vice-Chancellor  of  the  University,  1848-1851 ;  and  Master  of  his 
College  from  1836  till  his  death  in  1870.] 


42  REMINISCENCES 

themselves,  unable  to  keep  their  gravity,  ducking 
behind  their  stalls.  Once  Plumptre's  text  was 
"Woman."  It  introduced  an  invective  against  the 
worship  of  the  Virgin  as  divine.  There  was  an- 
other Fellow  and  preacher  who  wore  a  very  high  and 
stiff  neck-cloth  in  which  every  other  sentence  was 
lost,  while  the  alternate  sentence  was  delivered  in  the 
shrillest  tone.  If,  therefore,  some  of  us  were  want- 
ing in  love  of  our  venerable  and  beautiful  liturgy, 
or  were  otherwise  undevout,  we  were  not  without 
an  excuse. 

The  real  religion  of  Eton  was  that  of  the  Classical 
Pantheon.  It  was  said  that  once  a  boy,  having  some 
spiritual  perplexities,  was  simple  enough  to  commu- 
nicate them  to  the  Head  Master.  The  Head  Master, 
when  he  had  recovered  from  the  shock,  told  him  that 
he  would  give  him  an  order  on  the  bookseller  for  a 
Greek  Testament  with  notes. 

The  masters,  however,  did  try  to  make  the  boys 
"gentlemen,"  a  character  rather  narrow  and  savouring 
of  caste,  yet  not  worthless.  Eton  boys  as  a  rule  were 
idle,  nor  was  their  moral  standard  high;  there  was 
nothing  in  them  like  the  moral  aim  or  earnestness  of 
Arnold's  pupils.  But  there  was  in  them  a  genuine  dis- 
like of  anything  mean  or  cowardly.  Their  conversa- 
tion was  clean;  they  did  not  swear,  or  talk  filth.  I 
believe  it  may  be  said  that  they  were  generally  ashamed 
to  lie,  and  would  not  have  lied  to  a  master.  Propriety 
and  cleanliness  in  dress  were  strictly  enforced.  Tall 


SCHOOL  43 

hats,  white  ties,  black  swallowtail  coats,  and  low  shoes, 
not  boots,  were  the  regulation  costume. 

The  Provost,  Dr.  Goodall,1  was  outwardly  and  in- 
wardly antique.  He  wore  knee-breeches,  a  cassock, 
shoes  with  buckles,  and  a  wig.  Against  change  of  any 
kind  he  set  his  face.  He  would  allow  no  improvements 
in  the  school  course  or  in  the  appointment  of  masters. 
He  would  not  allow  a  curtain  to  be  hung  over  the  door 
of  the  chapel,  though  half  the  sixth  form,  whose  seats 
were  near  the  door,  were  laid  up  with  colds.  By  his 
command  of  the  Eton  vote  in  Parliament,  he  forced 
the  Great  Western  Railway  out  of  its  course,  and  its 
eccentricities  between  Slough  and  Windsor  are  a  monu- 
ment of  his  love  of  the  ancient  ways.  It  was  said,  and 
was  hardly  incredible,  that  when  his  letters  were 
brought  by  rail  he  would  not  open  them  till  they  ought 
to  have  come  by  stage.  He  was  autocrat,  and  under 
him  there  could  be  no  reform.  His  successor,  Provost 
Hodgson,2  had  been  a  boon  companion  of  Byron  and 
a  translator  of  Juvenal.  It  might  have  been  thought 
that  he  was  a  liberal  and  a  reformer.  Instead  of  this, 
he  opposed  all  reform,  even  the  proposal  pressed  by  the 
Head  Master,  Hawtrey,3  to  give  the  school  a  free  choice 
of  masters  instead  of  being  confined  to  the  Fellows  of 
King's. 

t1  Joseph  Goodall,  became  Head  Master  in  1801,  and  Provost  in 

1809.     Died  in  1840.] 

[2  Francis  Hodgson,  Provost  from  1840  till  his  death  in  1852.] 
[3  Edward  Craven  Hawtrey,  Assistant  Master  1814-1834 ;  Head 

Master  1834-1852 ;  Provost  1852-1862.] 


44  REMINISCENCES 

Dr.  E.  Craven  Hawtrey,  the  Head  Master,  was  also  a 
singular  figure,  though  in  a  very  different  way.  As 
Eton  was  contrasted  with  the  high  moral  and  religious 
tension  of  Arnold's  Rugby,  so  was  Hawtrey  contrasted 
with  Arnold.  He  was  a  man  of  the  world,  a  man  of 
fashion,  at  home  not  only  in  London  but  in  Parisian 
society,  a  sumptuous  Amphitryon,  an  elegant  but  far 
from  deep  scholar,  a  writer  of  little  verses  in  several 
languages,  a  collector  of  choice  books  in  superb  bindings, 
a  connoisseur  in  wines,  a  dandy  in  dress.  I  see  him  now, 
calling  over  the  roll  in  his  rich  silk  gown  and  cassock, 
his  gold  eyeglass  pendent  from  a  heavy  golden  chain, 
his  foot,  which  was  his  only  beauty,  put  forward  in 
his  patent-leather  boot;  now  sitting  in  the  sixth  class 
schoolroom  and  commending  some  happy  rendering 
of  a  phrase  in  Horace  or  dilating  on  the  remarkable 
body  of  the  ancient  wines.  His  features  were  the 
delight  of  the  caricaturist,  and  little  wooden  busts  of 
him  were  in  demand.  He  was  a  man  of  sense,  and  would 
have  made  reforms  if  the  Provost  would  have  let  him. 
He  did  get  so  far  as  to  introduce  into  the  work  of  one 
class  the  filling  up  of  a  skeleton  map,  which,  with  an- 
swers to  a  paper  of  geographical  questions,  we  handed 
in  as  an  act  of  piety  on  Sunday  afternoon.  He  did  not 
rule  with  a  very  firm  hand,  but  floated  along  with 
tact  and  ease.  He  was  in  manners  and  sentiments 
unquestionably  a  gentleman;  for  the  Eton  of  those 
days  that  was  enough. 

Foreigners    of    distinction    often    visited    Eton    as 


SCHOOL  45 

Hawtrey's  guests.  I  saw  in  the  schoolyard  Daniel 
Webster,1  with  his  brow  and  port  of  Jove.  I  saw 
Soult,2  who  looked  the  war-worn  veteran  that  he  was. 
Soult,  when  the  boys  recognized  him  and  rushed  to 
him,  was  half  afraid  that  they  were  going  to  mob 
their  old  enemy,  and  was  surprised  at  receiving  a 
British  ovation. 

Old  William  IV,  the  sailor  King,  was  very  fond  of 
Eton,  and  used  to  come  to  our  rowing  matches  and  to 
the  procession  of  boats  on  the  fourth  of  July.  On 
Election  Day,  at  the  end  of  the  Summer  term,  the  sixth 
form  had  to  recite  in  Court-dress  passages  from  Greek 
or  Latin  authors,  " speeches,"  they  were  called,  before 
the  assembled  school  and  guests.  On  one  of  those 
occasions  the  Queen  3  was  present.  At  her  side  stood 
the  Prince  Consort,  with  features  regular  and  handsome, 
but  wanting  in  expression.  Canonized  for  his  virtues 
when  he  died,  the  Prince  while  he  lived  was  unpopular 
on  account  of  his  manner,  especially  with  women. 
Englishmen  will  bear  a  high  manner  in  high  people, 
though  a  frank  manner  pleases  them  more ;  but  Prince 
Albert  had  in  fatal  perfection  the  condescending  man- 

P  The  American  statesman,  orator,  and  lawyer.  It  was  probably 
when  he  was  negotiating  the  Ashburton  Treaty  between  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States  that  he  visited  Eton.  Born  1782; 
died  1852.] 

P  Nicolas  Jean-de-Dieu  Soult,  one  of  Napoleon's  Marshals ; 
commander-in-chief  in  Spain.  Ambassador  Extraordinary  to  Great 
Britain  at  the  coronation  of  Queen  Victoria  in  1838,  when,  probably, 
he  visited  Eton.  Born  in  1769;  died  in  1851.] 

[s  Queen  Victoria,  of  course ;  who  succeeded  William  IV  in  1837.] 


46  REMINISCENCES 

ner  of  German  royalty.  Happily  he  did  not  transmit 
it  to  his  son.1 

Nothing  is  to  me  more  odious  than  the  pageantry  of 
death.  I  would  have  the  tenantless  clay  mingle  in 
the  simplest  as  well  as  in  the  quickest  way  with  the 
general  frame.  Yet  the  funeral  of  a  Royal  Duchess 
which  I  attended  as  one  of  the  Eton  delegation  was  a 
striking  sight.  St.  George's  Chapel  at  night,  hung  with 
black,  lines  of  Life  Guards  holding  flambeaux,  the 
approach  of  the  corpse  heralded  by  the  Dead  March, 
the  procession  up  the  Chapel  with  the  female  mourners 
in  black  lace  veils  reaching  to  their  feet,  certainly 
formed  an  impressive  scene. 

I  ran  among  a  crowd  of  Eton  boys  behind  Victoria's 
carriage  from  Eton  to  Windsor  on  the  night  of  her 
marriage,2  and  I  saw  her  more  than  once  upon  the 
Castle  Terrace.  She  was  dumpy  but  comely,  with  a 
fresh  complexion,  low  forehead,  receding  chin,  and 
prominent  eyes.  She  had  in  short  the  features  of  her 
family.  Notwithstanding  her  dumpiness,  she  acquired 
a  queenly  bearing.  In  everything,  I  suspect,  she  was 
a  true  granddaughter  of  George  III.  In  the  earlier 
years  of  her  reign  her  very  natural  attachment  to  Lord 
Melbourne  3  as  her  political  monitor  and  guardian,  and 
her  consequent  connection  with  his  party,  exposed  her 

[l  Afterwards  His  Majesty  Edward  VII.] 

[2  February  the  10th,  1840.] 

[*  William  Lamb,  second  Viscount  Melbourne,  Prime  Minister 
from  1835  till  1841 ;  Queen  Victoria's  chief  adviser.  Born  in  1779  ; 
died  1848.] 


SCHOOL  47 

to  the  jealousy  of  the  other  side.  In  her  later  years 
political  and  social  reaction  exalted  her  into  their  fetish. 
She  was  made  the  object  of  extravagant  adulation,  and 
an  age  full  of  intellect,  discovery,  great  writers,  power- 
ful statesmen,  and  momentous  events  has  been  stamped 
with  the  name  of  a  good  and  domestically  exemplary, 
but  in  no  way  extraordinary  woman.  In  politics  she 
evidently  became  at  last  a  thorough  Stuart,  enraged 
at  the  honour  paid  to  Garibaldi. 

Among  my  schoolmates  at  Eton  were  John  Duke 
Coleridge,1  Lord  Chief  Justice  that  was  to  be,  in  "  Pop," 
as  afterwards  at  the  Bar,  noted  for  his  silvery  eloquence ; 
Lord  Farrer 2  who  became  Permanent  Under-Secretary 
of  the  Board  of  Trade,  and,  though  he  had  inherited 
an  ample  fortune,  continued  in  the  public  service; 
Henry  Hallam,3  who  entered  on  the  same  day  with  me ; 
and  William  Johnson,4  who  afterwards  took  the  name 
of  Cory.  Henry  Hallam,  like  Arthur,  had  "the  bow 
of  Michael  Angelo  "  on  his  forehead.  Like  Arthur  he 

p  First  Baron  Coleridge.  He  was  the  chief  Counsel  for  the 
defendants  in  the  celebrated  "Tichborne  case"  in  1871-1872. 
Born  1820 ;  died  1894.] 

[2  Thomas  Henry  Farrer,  first  Baron  Farrer.  Born  in  1819 ; 
died  in  1899.] 

[3  Henry  Fitzmaurice  Hallam,  younger  son  of  Henry  Hallam  the 
historian,  brother  of  the  Arthur  Hallam  who  was  the  subject  of 
Tennyson's  "In  Memoriam."  He  went  to  Trinity  College,  Cam- 
bridge, and  was  one  of  the  "Apostles."  Born  in  1824;  died  1850.] 

[4  William  Johnson,  afterwards  Cory,  was  an  assistant  master  at 
Eton  from  1845  till  1872.  He  wrote  a  "Guide  to  Modern  English 
History " ;  also  several  volumes  of  poems  —  amongst  the  best 
known  of  which,  perhaps,  is  his  "lonica."  Born  in  1823;  died  in 
1892.] 


48  REMINISCENCES 

was  wonderfully  precocious  in  thoughtfulness  and 
culture,  owing  the  culture  to  the  circle  in  which  at  his 
father's  house  he  had  lived.  Whether  either  of  the 
brothers  had  genius  as  well  as  thoughtfulness  and  cul- 
ture was  a  question  left  unsolved,  since  both  died 
young  and  under  circumstances  curiously  alike ;  each  of 
them  suddenly,  when  he  was  on  a  tour  with  his  father. 
Of  William  Johnson  great  things  were  expected.  We 
fancied  that  he  would  be  a  sage  not  unlike  his  illustrious 
namesake.  The  result  was  distinction,  both  educa- 
tional and  literary,  which  has  won  a  niche  in  the  Na- 
tional Biography.  But  it  was  not  a  reproduction  of 
Johnson,  whom  we  cannot  imagine  writing  lyrics  of 
effusive  affection  on  a  favourite  pupil. 

Our  mode  of  life  was  favourable  to  friendship.  We 
dined  in  the  boarding-house  hall,  but  took  breakfast 
and  tea  in  our  own  rooms  with  messmates  of  our  own 
choice.  Each  boy  had  a  room  of  his  own,  furnished  as 
a  sitting-room,  but  with  a  press  bed.  I  think  it  was  a 
civilizing  arrangement. 

It  is  something,  as  I  have  always  thought,  to  be 
brought  up  in  a  place  of  beauty  and  historic  memories. 
All  that  could  be  done  for  the  young  heart  in  that  way 
was  done  by  Eton,  with  its  ancient  quadrangle,  in  the 
middle  of  which  stood  the  founder's  statue,  its  great 
grey  chapel,  its  playing-fields  and  their  ancient  elms 
stretching  along  the  side  of  the  river,  and  the  class- 
room on  the  panels  of  which  boyish  hands  had  carved 
what  afterwards  became  historic  names;  while  from 


SCHOOL  49 

the  other  side  looked  down  the  castle-palace  of  the 
old  English  Kings. 

I  am  now  in  my  seventeenth  year.1  I  doff  the  regu- 
lation dress  of  Eton,  don  the  black  tie,  which  was  the 
symbol  of  emancipation,  take  leave  of  the  Head  Master, 
placing  my  leaving-fee  on  the  table,  while  I  receive 
his  parting  gift  of  a  book,  and  come  away,  looking  ea- 
gerly forward  into  the  doubtful  vista  of  the  life,  then 
opening,  now  at  its  close. 

I1 1840.     He  matriculated  at  Oxford  on  the  26th  of  May,  1841.] 


CHAPTER  IV 

OXFORD 
1841-1845 

Dean  Gaisford  —  Magdalen — Magdalen  Demys  —  Martin  Routh 
—  Fellows  of  Magdalen — The  Tractarian  Movement — The 
Curriculum — Oxford  Life  —  Contemporaries. 

I  MATRICULATED  at  Christ  Church,  and  was  thus 
brought  into  brief  contact  with  Dean  Gaisford.1  The 
Dean  was  called  the  Athenian  Blacksmith,  and  both 
parts  of  the  nickname  were  well  deserved.  He  was  a 
first-rate  Greek  scholar,  though  I  venture  to  think 
that  as  an  editor  of  the  classics  he  adheres  somewhat 
slavishly  to  certain  manuscripts.  But  for  his  manners 
his  friends  could  only  say  that  his  heart  was  good; 
which,  as  an  autopsy  was  not  possible,  could  give  little 
satisfaction  to  those  who  suffered  from  his  rudeness. 
"  Cultivate  classical  literature,  which  not  only  enables 
you  to  look  down  with  contempt  on  those  who  are  less 
learned  than  yourself,  but  often  leads  to  places  of  con- 
siderable emolument,  even  in  this  world."  Such  was 
the  comic  analysis  of  one  of  Gaisford's  University 
sermons,  and  probably  it  was  scarcely  a  caricature. 

P  Thomas  Gaisford ;  appointed  Regius  Professor  of  Greek  at 
Oxford  in  1812 ;  Dean  of  Christ  Church  from  1831  till  his  death  in 
1855 ;  edited  many  of  the  classics.  Born  in  1779.] 

50 


OXFORD  51 

However,  from  Christ  Church  I  was  soon  transferred 
to  Magdalen,  where,  at  the  instance  of  my  good  friend 
Frederick  Bulley,1  afterwards  President,  I  was  nomi- 
nated to  a  Demyship  by  the  President,  Martin  Routh.2 
My  Magdalen,  like  my  Eton,  was  a  relic  of  the  past. 
It  had  forty  Fellowships,  thirty  Demyships  or  Scholar- 
ships, and  a  revenue  of  forty  thousand  pounds  a  year, 
besides  its  rich  dower  of  historic  beauty.  It  took  no 
Commoners,  and  its  educational  output  in  my  time 
was  eight  or  ten  Undergraduate  Demys  and  one  Gentle- 
man Commoner,  who  being  under  the  phantom  author- 
ity of  the  nonagenarian  President,  lived  in  a  license 
beyond  even  the  normal  license  of  his  class.  Frederick 
Bulley,  afterwards  President,  did  something  for  us  as 
tutor  at  least  in  the  way  of  most  kindly  interest  and 
encouragement ;  but  we  really  depended  for  instruction 
upon  private  tutors;  "coaches"  they  were  called. 
I  was  coached  at  different  times  by  Congreve,3  then 
Fellow  of  Wadham,  and  a  strong  Liberal  and  Evangel- 
ical of  Arnold's  school,  afterwards  a  Comtist  and  head 
of  one  section  of  the  Positivist  Church  in  England; 
by  the  excellent  Mountague  Bernard,4  afterwards 
Professor  of  Law,  and,  what  was  perhaps  more  impor- 

f1  Frederick  Bulley,  President  of  Magdalen  College  from  1855 
tiU  his  death  in  1885.] 

[2  Martin  Joseph  Routh,  President  of  Magdalen  from  1791  till 
his  death  in  1854.  Born  in  1755.] 

[3  Richard  Congreve,  the  Positivist ;  founded  the  Positivist  com- 
munity in  London  in  1855.  1818-1899.] 

[4  Mountague  Bernard,  first  Professor  of  International  Law  at 
Oxford,  1859-1874.  Born  1820 ;  died  1882.] 


52  REMINISCENCES 

tant,  one  of  the  founders  of  The  Guardian;  and  by  Lin- 
wood,1  the  author  of  an  edition  of  ^Eschylus  and  the 
editor  of  the  Musce  Oxonienses.  Linwood  was  a 
prodigy.  He  had  written  in  an  examination  ninety- 
nine  Greek  iambic  verses,  which  may  be  seen  slightly 
cut  down  in  the  Musce  Oxonienses,  and  which  might 
easily  pass  for  an  extract  from  a  second-rate  play  of 
Euripides.  But  he  never  sustained  his  Undergraduate 
reputation.  His  ^Eschylus  is  jejune,  and  he  somehow 
ended  in  eclipse. 

I  was  fortunate  in  the  members  of  our  little  circle 
of  Demys.     With  pensive  interest  I  recall  their  names. 
One  of  them  I  saw  afterwards  a  Roman  Catholic  priest. 
We  lived  a  happy  life  in  our  junior  Common  Room, 
seeing  perhaps  rather  too  little  of  the  University  out- 
side, though  my  Eton  connection  gave  me  acquaint- 
ances.    Our  star  was  Conington,2  afterwards  Professor 
of  Latin,  who  had  come  up  from  Rugby  a  wonderful 
scholar  with  a  miraculous  memory  and  carried  every- 
thing before   him  in  examinations.     His  figure  was 
rather  grotesque,  and  there  was  about  him  a  touch  of 
the  Dominie  Sampson  which  tempted  little  practical 
jokes,  though  the  story  of  his  having  been  put  under 
the  pump  is  totally  baseless  and  utterly  unjust  to  his 

II  William  Linwood,  public  examiner  at  Oxford  1850-1851.     His 
best-known  works  are  "A  Lexicon  to^schylus,"  1843,  and  "Sopho- 
clis  Tragcedise,"  1846.     Born  1817 ;   died  1878.] 

[2  John"  Conington,  Professor  of  Latin  from  1854  till  his  death  in 
1869.  Edited  many  of  the  classics ;  published  some  verse  transla- 
tions. Born  in  1825.] 


OXFORD  53 

college  mates,  who  were  all  of  them  as  quiet  and  well 
bred  as  they  could  be.  His  learning  perhaps  was  supe- 
rior to  his  taste ;  but  he  was  a  great  scholar,  and  would 
have  been  greater  had  not  his  life  been  cut  short. 
He  seemed  to  be  the  toughest  of  men,  and  little  did  I 
think  that  I  should  survive  him. 

My  kind  father  allowed  me  a  horse,  and  pleasant 
rides  I  had  over  the  higher  country  round  the  flat  on 
which  Oxford  is  built,  by  Bagley,  Elsfield,  Wood  Eaton, 
Stow  Wood,  Beckley,  and  other  points  of  beauty.  The 
country  was  more  open  to  the  horseman  then  than  it 
is  now.  Lord  Abingdon  1  kindly  lent  me  a  key  to  his 
lovely  Park  at  Wytham.  Those  rides  were  favourable 
to  reflection  as  well  as  to  health  and  enjoyment.  The 
beauty  of  the  College  itself,  with  its  Gothic  Quadrangle, 
its  lawns,  and  its  deer-park,  was  a  perpetual  delight. 
It  would  be  hard  to  say  whether  the  Quadrangle  looked 
its  best  under  the  summer  sun  or  under  the  winter  moon 
when  the  snow  lay  on  its  roofs.  Once  more  I  was  happy 
in  aesthetic  influences  as  an  element  of  education. 

About  our  President,  Martin  Routh,  much  has 
already  been  written.  He  died  of  an  accidental  mal- 
ady in  his  hundredth  year.  He  had  lived  with  Parr.2 
As  an  Undergraduate  he  had  seen  Dr.  Johnson.  He 
had  seen  the  elevation  of  the  house  of  Temple  to  the 
peerage;  and  he  saw  its  fall.  Yet  he  had  been  so 

t1  Montagu  Bertie,  the  sixth  Earl  of  Abingdon,  High  Steward  of 
Oxford  and  Abingdon,  Lord-Lieutenant  and  Gustos  Rotulorum  of 
Berks.  1808-1884.] 

[2  Samuel  Parr,  1747-1825.] 


54  REMINISCENCES 

wrapped  up  in  his  study  of  the  Fathers  and  such  a 
recluse  that  he  had  little  to  say  about  the  times  through 
which  he  had  lived ;  outside  of  his  books,  county  gene- 
alogies were  his  theme.  He  was  never  seen  but  in 
full  canonicals  of  the  fashion  of  the  last  century. 
Somebody  bet  that  he  would  show  Routh  without  his 
canonicals,  and  thought  to  win  the  bet  by  crying  'fire,' 
of  which  Routh  was  horribly  afraid,  at  the  dead  of  night 
under  his  window.  Routh  at  once  appeared,  in  a  great 
fright,  but  in  full  canonicals.  Such  was  the  story. 
Routh  prolonged  his  life  by  excessive  care,  living  as 
it  were  under  a  glass  case  and  never  going  abroad  except 
in  the  finest  summer  weather.  On  a  Sunday  in  summer 
at  afternoon  chapel  there  would  sometimes  be  a  move- 
ment among  the  visitors  in  the  ante-chapel,  which, 
with  the  reverential  attitude  of  the  porter  and  presently 
the  shuffling  of  aged  feet,  announced  the  President's 
approach.  Till  near  the  end  of  his  life  Routh  presided 
at  the  terminal  examinations,  Collections,  as  they  were 
called,  when  he  would  put  questions  on  the  history  of 
the  Odyssey,  and  explain  that  in  those  days  no  inde- 
cency was  involved  in  the  attendance  of  ladies  on  gen- 
tlemen in  the  bath.  His  deafness,  increased  by  his 
wig,  combined  with  his  old-fashioned  respect  for  rank, 
once  led  to  a  funny  incident.  A  Gentleman  Commoner, 
son  of  a  Baronet,  having  been  beyond  measure  lawless, 
was  being  reprimanded  by  the  tutors.  The  President, 
who  had  been  looking  the  other  way,  hearing  the  loud 
sound  of  voices,  turned  round,  saw  a  Baronet's  son  on 


OXFORD  55 

the  opposite  side  of  the  table,  and  taking  it  for  granted 
that  the  Tutors  were  paying  him  compliments,  chimed 
in  with,  "I  am  very  happy,  Mr.  Blank,  to  hear  what 
the  tutors  say  of  you.  Pray  tell  Sir  Charles  with  my 
compliments  that  you  are  a  credit  to  the  College." 

The  President  held  with  his  Presidency  the  country 
living  of  Theale  *  where  he  was  said  to  preach  erudite 
sermons  to  the  rustics.  "I  know,  my  friends,  that  you 
may  object  to  me  what  St.  Irenaeus  says." 

Routh's  Patristic  learning,  which  was  then  unique 
and  had  produced  the  Reliquice  Sacrce,  made  him  a 
grand  card  for  the  Tractarians  when  their  movement 
began.  Yet  by  those  who  knew  him  well  it  was  thought 
doubtful  whether  he  really  cared  much  about  the  mat- 
ter. Curiosity,  they  said,  rather  than  anything  else, 
was  the  leading  motive  of  his  Patristic  studies. 

Routh  had  become  President  before  the  idea  of  aca- 
demic duty  had  dawned.  This  perhaps  is  sufficient 
excuse  for  the  state  of  sinecurism  and  torpor  in  which  to 
the  end  of  his  days  he  allowed  that  magnificent  College 
to  remain.  Roundell  Palmer,2  afterwards  Lord  Sel- 
borne,  then  a  Fellow  of  Magdalen,  among  others  moved 
for  reform.  But  the  answer  always  was,  "Wait,  sir, 
till  I  am  gone." 

The  Fellows  of  Magdalen  were  a  curious  assortment. 
Some  were  relics  of  the  age  depicted  in  the  well-known 

P  A  parish  about  four  miles  from  Reading.] 
P  Roundell  Palmer,  first  Earl  of  Selborne,  Lord  Chancellor  in 
1872.] 


56  REMINISCENCES 

words  of  Gibbon,  using  the  college  as  a  tavern  and  a 
shooting-box.  Two  or  three  were  ascetics  of  the  new 
Tractarian  school.  Charles  Reade,1  the  novelist,  was 
a  non-resident  Fellow.  He  came  into  residence  for 
one  year  for  the  sake  of  holding  a  College  office  to  which 
a  nomination  was  attached.  His  costume  was  a  green 
frock-coat  with  brass  buttons,  and  his  behaviour  was 
not  less  eccentric  than  his  costume.  We  took  him, 
in  fact,  to  be  almost  crazy.  Of  the  Tractarians  the 
most  notable  were  James  Mozley  2  and  William  Palmer.3 
Many  years  afterwards,  when  the  Regius  Professorship 
of  Theology  was  vacant,  I  was  asked  by  a  friend  who 
was  a  member  of  the  Government  whom  they  ought  to 
appoint.  My  answer  was  that  of  preachers,  commen- 
tators, and  writers  on  ecclesiastical  history  there  were 
plenty ;  but  that  the  only  theologian  in  the  proper  sense 
of  the  term  known  to  me  was  James  Mozley.  I  have 
no  reason  to  believe  that  my  opinion  had  any  influence 
in  the  appointment ;  but  if  it  had,  supposing  Theology 
not  to  be  an  extinct  science,  I  was  justified  by  the  re- 
sult. Mozley  was  a  Tractarian,  but  short  of  Rome. 

William  Palmer,  brother  of  Roundell  Palmer,  after- 
wards Lord  Selborne,  was  a  man  of  genius  whose 
genius  took  a  singular  turn.  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  him. 

[l  Charles  Reade  was  elected  Fellow  of  Magdalen  in  1835.  Born 
1814 ;  died  1884.] 

[2  James  Bowling  Mozley,  Regius  Professor  of  Divinity  in  1871 ; 
Bampton  Lecturer ;  Canon  of  Worcester.  Born  1813  :  died  1878.] 

[3  William  Palmer ;  Theologian  and  archaeologist ;  brother  of 
Roundell  Palmer ;  Fellow  of  Magdalen.  1811  to  1879.] 


OXFORD  57 

Don  Quixote  did  not  live  in  the  age  of  chivalry  more 
completely  than  did  William  Palmer  in  the  age  of  me- 
dieval religion.  As  an  inn  was  a  castle  to  Don  Quixote, 
to  William  Palmer  the  Colleges  were  monasteries,  only 
with  a  rule  unhappily  relaxed,  the  Fellows  were  monks, 
the  scouts  or  College  servants  were  lay  brethren. 
Protestantism  he  anathematized,  earning  thereby  the 
name  of  "  Cursing  Palmer."  His  leaning,  however, 
was  not  to  the  Roman,  but  to  the  Greek  Church,  which 
attracted  him  by  its  superior  rigidity.  To  bring  the 
Anglican  Church  into  communion  with  the  Greek 
Church,  or  rather  to  get  the  communion  in  which  he 
supposed  they  already  were  recognized,  was  the  object 
of  his  life.  For  that  purpose  he  went  to  Russia,  and 
there  opened  before  the  heads  of  the  Greek  Church 
his  budget  of  High  Church  doctrine,  assuring  them  that 
such  was  the  creed  of  the  Church  of  England.  But 
the  Evangelical  Chaplain  of  the  Embassy  at  St.  Peters- 
burg —  I  believe  it  was  he  —  being  called  upon  for  his 
attestation,  declared  that  the  High  Church  doctrines 
were  anathema.  An  untoward  accident  occurred. 
The  wife  *  of  Palmer's  Russian  host,  travelling  in  Swit- 
zerland, was  converted  to  Protestantism  by  an  English 
clergyman  of  the  Evangelical  party.  Her  husband 
was  horrified.  Palmer  had  averred  that  the  two 
Churches  were  in  communion  with  each  other.  Yet 
here  was  an  Anglican  clergyman  converting  his  wife  as 
if  she  were  a  heretic  or  a  heathen.  Palmer  at  once 
[l  Princess  Galitzin.] 


58  REMINISCENCES 

started  in  chase.  He  pursued  the  lady  from  place  to 
place,  entering  his  caveat  when  she  presented  herself 
to  receive  the  Communion.  From  Bishop  Spencer,1 
then  ministering  in  Paris,  he  received  some  encourage- 
ment. Returning  to  England,  he  put  to  each  of  the 
Bishops  the  question  whether  their  Church  was  in  com- 
munion with  the  Greek  Church,  and  got  a  series  of 
evasive  replies,  the  gist  of  which  was  that  the  Greek 
Church  was  a  long  way  off.  From  Archbishop  Howley  2 
he  got  two  letters,  but  no  reply.  Then  he  tried  the 
Anglican  Church  in  Scotland,  and  proposed  to  attend 
a  Synod  on  the  question  as  the  deputy  of  Bishop 
Spencer.  But  the  answer  was  that  Bishops  could  not 
sit  by  deputy,  and  that  Bishop  Spencer  was  dead. 
Palmer  then  resolved  to  enter  the  Greek  Church.  But 
the  Greek  Church  required  him  to  be  re-baptized,  and 
re-baptism  in  his  eyes  was  unlawful,  baptism  by  heretics 
being  valid.  Not  very  logically  he  then  turned  to  the 

[l  George  Trevor  Spencer,  Bishop  of  Madras ;  graduated,  Uni- 
versity College,  Oxford,  1822  ;  consecrated  1837  ;  Chancellor  of  St. 
Paul's  Cathedral  1860.  Born  in  1799,  died  in  1866.  I  learn  from 
a  private  letter  that  he  was  Chaplain  to  the  French  Chapel  in  the 
Rue  Marbceuf  about  the  year  1840,  just  before  he  was  made  Bishop 
of  Madras.  And  I  find  this  verified  in  "  Phases  of  My  Life,"  by  the 
Very  Rev.  Francis  Pigou,  D.D.,  Dean  of  Bristol,  chapter  ix,  pages 
150  and  151  (London  :  Edward  Arnold  ;  1898),  in  which  the  Dean 
says  :  " .  .  .  Bishop  Spencer,  formerly  Bishop  of  Madras,  .  .  .  had 
had  the  offer  of  Marboeuf  Chapel  in  Paris.  .  .  .  The  church,  if 
such  it  could  be  called,  was  situate  at  the  bottom  of  the  Avenue 
Marboeuf,  a  side  street  off  the  Champs  Elysees,  of  which  now 
scarcely  any  trace  is  left.  It  was  originally  founded  by  Mr.  Lewis 
Way,  in  1824."] 

[2  William  Howley,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  from  1828  to  1848. 
Born  1776.] 


OXFORD  59 

Church  of  Rome,  which,  however,  he  succeeded  in 
entering  without  undergoing  the  conditional  re-baptism 
commonly  required  of  converts.  Here  his  genius 
found  its  grave.  Fantastic  Egyptology,  founded  on 
the  fancy  that  Satan  had  concocted  the  Egyptian 
religion  in  mockery  of  Christianity,  occupied  him  till 
he  died. 

If  William  Palmer  was  an  ecclesiastical  Don  Quixote, 
he  was  also  an  ecclesiastical  Ulysses.  He  had  seen  and 
studied  every  variety  of  religious  belief  and  life.  His 
conversation  was  most  interesting;  his  language  was 
racy  in  the  highest  degree.  After  his  Russian  adventure 
he  wrote  a  book  upon  Church  questions  which  you  were 
allowed  to  purchase  on  declaring  yourself  a  faithful 
layman,  and  which  the  virtuoso,  if  he  ever  meets  with 
it  on  a  bookstall,  not  having  to  make  that  declaration, 
will  do  well  to  acquire.  "Then  certain  of  the  baser 
sort  made  a  conspiracy  and  cut  off  his  head,"  this  or 
something  like  this  is  the  account  of  the  rebellion  against 
Charles  I. 

It  was  to  Roundell  Palmer,  then  a  non-resident  Fel- 
low of  Magdalen,  afterwards  Lord  Selborne  and  Chan- 
cellor, who  had  kindly  taken  notice  of  a  young  student, 
that  I  owed  my  introduction  to  his  brother.  I  owed 
to  him  much  more,  —  the  boon,  for  which  I  could  never 
be  sufficiently  grateful,  of  his  friendship  in  after-life. 
His  history  it  is  needless  to  repeat.  He  was  a  grand 
example  of  the  union  of  high  intellectual  culture  and 
literary  tastes  with  the  greatest  professional  energy 


60  REMINISCENCES 

and  success.  His  power  of  work  was  wonderful.  When 
he  was  Attorney-General,  about  the  hardest  place  then 
in  the  world,  I  called  one  Wednesday  afternoon  at  his 
Chambers.  His  clerk  said  at  first  that  he  would  see 
me,  then  added,  "I  think  you  had  better  not  go  in." 
"  Why  not  ?  "  "Sir  Roundell  has  not  been  in  bed  this 
week."  Palmer  told  me  afterwards  that  it  was  true; 
that  he  had  been  working  hard  to  earn  his  Christmas 
holiday,  and  had  not  gone  to  bed  till  Wednesday  night. 

The  wit  of  the  Magdalen  Common  Room  was  New- 
man 1  (not  John  Henry),  a  first-rate  mimic.  One  day 
he  amused  himself  by  masquerading  as  a  stranger 
visiting  Oxford  and  hiring  a  guide  to  show  him  round, 
which  the  guide  did  with  the  usual  illustrative  com- 
ments. When  at  last  they  came  to  Magdalen,  the  guide 
pointed  out  the  Fellows'  Common  Room.  To  his  sur- 
prise and  horror  Newman  bolted  into  it  and  was  seen 
no  more. 

Now  was  the  crisis  of  the  Tractarian  movement,  of 
which  the  Ritualist  movement  is  the  less  earnest  and 
masculine  successor.  The  source  of  Tractarianism  is 
plainly  disclosed  in  the  opening  of  the  " Tracts."  Lib- 
eralism was  advancing,  the  support  of  the  State  was 
failing  the  Church,  and  threatened  to  be  withdrawn 
from  her  altogether.  She  must  therefore  Jook  for  sup- 
port elsewhere,  and  she  would  find  it  in  Apostolical 

I1  Perhaps  Thomas  Harding  Newman,  of  Wadham  College. 
Matriculated  in  1829 ;  a  Demy  of  Magdalen  from  1832  to  1847 ; 
Fellow,  1846  to  1873  ;  Dean  of  Divinity  1849  ;  died  1882.  —  But 
I  am  not  sure.  —  Ed.] 


OXFORD  61 

Succession  and  the  supernatural  virtue  of  the  Sacra- 
ments administered  by  priestly  hands.  Oxford,  with 
her  medieval  Colleges  and  her  clerical  and  celibate 
Fellows,  was  the  natural  centre  of  a  movement  which 
pointed  to  a  revival  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  dining- 
hall  of  Magdalen,  where  the  diners  usually  were  so  few, 
was  full  enough  on  the  day  of  the  ecclesiastical  Ar- 
mageddon, when  all  the  country  parsons  came  up  to 
vote  on  the  condemnation  of  Ward.1  I  was  unlucky 
in  never  hearing  Newman  2  preach.  He  had  just  been 
forced  by  the  heads  of  the  University  to  retire  from 
the  pulpit  of  St.  Mary's  and  had  withdrawn  with  a 
select  circle  of  disciples  to  his  monastery  at  Little- 
more.3  I  heard  him  read  the  service,  which  he  did  in  a 
mechanical  monotone,  that  he  might  seem  to  be  the 
mere  mouthpiece  of  the  Church.  His  face,  I  always 
thought,  betokened  refinement  and  acuteness  much 
more  than  strength.  He  was  always  in  quest,  not  of 
the  truth,  but  of  the  best  system,  presenting  a  sharp 
contrast  to  his  brother  Francis,4  whom  also  I  knew 


t1  The  Reverend  William  George  Ward,  nicknamed  "Ideal  Ward," 
one  of  the  chief  figures  of  the  Tractarian  movement.  Wrote  in 
defence  of  Newman's  celebrated  "Tract  XC."  The  reference  is  to, 
his  removal  from  his  Degree  for  heresy ;  joined  the  Roman  Catholic 
Communion  and  wrote  in  favour  of  Papal  infallibility ;  published 
many  controversial  treatises.  1812-1882.] 

[2  John  Henry,  Cardinal  Newman.     Born  1801 ;  died  1890.] 

p  Two  miles  and  a  half  from  Oxford.] 

[4  Francis  William  Newman,  Fellow  of  Balliol ;  afterwards  Prin- 
cipal of  University  Hall,  London;  author  of  a  "History  of  Hebrew 
Monarchy,"  "The  Soul,"  "Phases  of  Faith,"  etc.  Born  1805; 
died  1897.] 


62  REMINISCENCES 

well,  and  who  through  all  his  changes  of  opinions 
sought  the  truth  with  singleness  of  heart.  The  "Gram- 
mar of  Assent "  *  is  an  apparatus  for  making  yourself 
believe  or  fancy  that  you  believe  things  which  are  good 
for  you  but  of  which  there  is  no  proof.  It  may  be 
doubted  whether,  when  the  hot  fit  of  conversion  was 
over,  Newman  was  a  hearty  Roman  Catholic,  or  believed, 
as  he  vowed  he  did,  in  St.  Januarius  and  the  House  of 
Loretto.  Manning 2  accused  him  of  minimizing  Ca- 
tholicism, and  he  never  would  make  converts  from  the 
Anglican  Church. 

Few  of  the  students  of  those  days,  few  at  least  of  the 
intellectual  and  serious  class,  were  proof  against  the 
witchery  of  Newman's  style  or  failed  to  be  fascinated 
by  his  romantic  presentation  of  the  medieval  Church 
after  the  aridity  of  the  "high  and  dry  "  regime. 

Pusey  3  I  used  to  see  going  about  with  sorrowful 
visage  and  downcast  eyes  and  looking  like  the  embodi- 
ment of  his  favourite  doctrine,  the  irremissibility  of 
post-baptismal  sin.  I  heard  him  preach.  He  was 
undeniably  learned,  but  by  no  means  logical  or  clear. 
His  catenas  wanted  a  link.  In  his  moral  passages, 
however,  he  was  highly  impressive  in  his  ascetic  way. 

Manning  I  saw  ascend  the  pulpit,  a  most  imposing 

P  "An  Essay  in  Aid  of  a  Grammar  of  Assent,"  first  published  in 
1870.  It  has  gone  through  several  editions.] 

[2  Henry  Edward  Manning,  Roman  Catholic  Archbishop  of  West- 
minster. Born  1808 ;  died  1892.] 

[3  Edward  Bouverie  Pusey,  Regius  Professor  of  Hebrew  at  Ox- 
ford ;  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  Oxford  Movement ;  a  notable  figure 
amongst  the  '  Ritualists '  of  the  time.  Born  in  1800  ;  died  in  1882.] 


OXFORD  63 

figure,  looking  like  an  apparition  of  the  Middle  Ages; 
but  I  thought  him  a  tinkling  cymbal,  as  in  fact  he  turns 
out  to  have  been.  That  he  would  never  have  seceded 
if  they  would  have  made  him  a  Bishop  was  the  opinion 
of  his  brother-in-law  Samuel  of  Oxford.1  Of  Ward  I 
happened  to  see  a  good  deal,  when  I  was  reading  with 
a  Fellow  of  Balliol  in  the  vacation  and  dined  in  their 
Common  Room.  He  was  a  first-rate  dialectician, 
shrinking  from  no  conclusion,  and  I  fancy  rather  revel- 
ling in  the  uproar  which  he  made.  His  joyous  avowal 
that  clergymen  of  the  Church  of  England  were  embrac- 
ing the  whole  cycle  of  Roman  Doctrine  brought  matters 
to  a  head  and  forced  the  hand  of  Newman,  who  had 
probably  looked  to  remaining  leader  in  the  Church  of 
England  and  ultimately  negotiating  reunion  with 
Rome.  Ward's  figure  was  grotesque,  almost  Fal- 
staffian ;  though  very  fat,  he  walked  with  a  sort  of  skip, 
and  wore  low  loose  shoes  which  he  had  a  trick  of  kicking 
off.  He  was  a  candidate  for  a  Fellowship  of  All  Souls' 
in  the  days  when  the  qualifications  for  election  there 
were  social,  and  candidates  were  invited  to  dine  with 
the  Warden  and  Fellows  that  their  social  aptitudes 
might  be  seen.  Ward,  so  the  story  ran,  kicked  his 
shoes  off  under  the  table;  a  rival  candidate  pushed 
them  away  from  him,  and  when  the  party  rose  to  pass 
from  the  Hall  into  the  Common  Room,  Ward  stood 

[l  Samuel  Wilberforce,  Bishop  of  Oxford,  and  then  of  Winchester. 
His  wife's  sister,  Caroline  Sargent,  married  in  1833  Henry  Edward, 
afterwards  Cardinal,  Manning.] 


64  REMINISCENCES 

up  without  his  shoes.  There  was  something  laughable 
about  all  that  he  said  or  did.  As  a  medievalist  he  advo- 
cated clerical  celibacy;  but,  to  use  his  own  expression, 
he  had  not  himself  the  gift  of  continence,  and  the  ascet- 
ics of  his  party  were  taken  aback  by  learning  that 
between  the  acts  of  his  condemnation  for  Romanism 
in  the  Theatre,  he  had  read  a  letter  from  a  lady  to  whom 
he  was  engaged.  Even  in  his  religious  writing  there 
was  a  f riskiness  which  seemed  to  show  that  he  enjoyed 
the  fun. 

Keble,1  who,  with  Newman  and  Pusey,  made  up  the 
Tractarian  Triumvirate,  had  left  Oxford,  married,  and 
taken  a  country  living.  Some  years  afterwards  I  ac- 
companied his  friend  Judge  Coleridge  on  a  visit  to  his 
house.  He  was  the  embodiment  of  the  sweet,  gentle, 
somewhat  mystical  and  not  very  masculine  poetry  of 
the  " Christian  Year."  Why  he  had  not  joined  the 
secession  was  evident  enough.  Besides  his  wife,  he 
had  a  conjugal  attachment,  like  that  of  George  Herbert, 
to  his  parish  Church.  I  was  told  that  he  loved  to  per- 
form service  in  it,  even  with  a  nominal  congregation. 
Nor  was  he  likely  to  be  drawn  into  anything  from  which 
his  heart  recoiled  by  the  pressure  of  strict  logic.  If 
he  was  troubled  by  the  lateness  of  the  Tractarian 
discovery  that  the  Prayer  Book,  not  the  Thirty-Nine 
Articles,  was  the  real  standard  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 

[l  John  Keble,  the  author  of  "The  Christian  Year";  Professor 
of  Poetry  at  Oxford  from  1831  to  1841 ;  Vicar  of  Hursley,  Hamp- 
shire, from  1836  till  his  death  in  1866.  Born  1792.] 


OXFORD  65 

land,  he  could  satisfy  himself  by  reference  to  the  anal- 
ogy of  the  Christian  Dispensation,  which  came  late 
into  the  world.  Butler's  " Analogy"1  was  in  those 
days  the  Oxford  Koran,  and  in  its  line  of  argument 
was  found  a  universal  solvent  of  the  theological  diffi- 
culties. A  very  great  book  Butler's  " Analogy"  un- 
doubtedly is ;  but  the  assumption  on  which  it  is  built, 
that  we  should  expect  in  Revelation  the  same  diffi- 
culties which  we  find  in  natural  religion,  is  palpably 
unfounded.  We  should  expect  Revelation  to  be  the 
corrective  of  the  difficulties  of  natural  religion,  not  their 
counterpart.  Butler,  however,  was  a  profound  thinker, 
and  in  spite  of  his  ecclesiastical  trammels  nobly  loyal 
to  reason  and  truth. 

Curious  forms  did  that  resurrection  of  the  ecclesias- 
tical past  bring  forth ;  but  none  more  curious  than  that 
of  John  Brande  Morris,2  who  in  the  Tower  of  Exeter 
College  fondly  watched  for  the  return  of  the  Dark  Ages.  /• 
He  wrote  a  poem  pronounced  by  some  Tractarians ' 

f  W^MM^  ^ 

equal  to  Milton's  in  excellence  and  superior  in  subject,         * 
in  which  he  spoke  of  oxen  as  "  trained  to  labour  by 
meek  celibacy." 

Let  me  by  the  way  correct  a  common  error  which  has 
crept  into  the  work  of  my  excellent  friend  President 

[x  "The  Analogy  of  Religion,  Natural  and  Revealed,  to  the 
Constitution  and  Course  of  Nature."  By  Joseph  Butler,  Bishop  of 
Durham.  First  published  in  1736.] 

[2  John  Brande  Morris,  Fellow  and  Hebrew  Lecturer,  Exeter 
College,  Oxford,  1837 ;  joined  the  Church  of  Rome  1846.  1812- 
1880.] 


66  REMINISCENCES 

White  on  the ' '  Warfare  of  Science  and  Religion."  1  It  is 
a  mistake  to  think  that  Everett,  the  American  Ambas- 
sador, was  hooted  in  the  Theatre  when  he  was  presented 
for  an  honorary  degree.  The  hooting  was  not  at 
Everett,2  but  at  Jelf,3  who  had  made  himself  very 
unpopular  as  Proctor.  Several  of  the  students  were 
punished  for  it.  I  was  in  the  Undergraduates'  gallery, 
and  saw  and  heard  it  all.  Everett  was  not  brought 
in  till  long  after  the  hooting  had  begun.  It  unluckily 
happened  that  there  was  at  the  same  time  a  Tractarian 
opposition  among  the  Graduates  to  Everett's  Honorary 
Degree  on  the  ground  that  he  was  a  Unitarian.  But 
the  opponents,  though  they  showed  their  intolerance, 
did  nothing  rude.  They  sent  a  deputation  to  Everett 
to  assure  him  that  no  personal  offence  was  intended. 
In  the  Theatre  they  did  no  more  than  formally  signify 
their  dissent  as  a  legal  precaution.  Throughout  this 
period  of  controversy,  earnest  and  sometimes  heated 
as  discussion  was,  social  tolerance  remained  generally 

[x  "A  History  on  the  Warfare  of  Science  with  Theology  in  Chris- 
tendom." By  Andrew  Dickson  White.  2  vols.  New  York : 
Appleton.  1896.  —  The  reference  is  to  Vol.  II.  pp.  335-336.  The 
incident  occurred  on  the  28th  of  June,  1843.] 

[2  Edward  Everett,  the  celebrated  American  statesman,  orator, 
and  author;  successively  Professor  of  Greek  at  Harvard  College, 
1819-1825 ;  member  of  Congress ;  Governor  of  Massachusetts ; 
Minister  to  England ;  President  of  Harvard  College ;  Secretary  of 
State;  United  States  Senator.  It  was  when  he  was  Minister  to 
England  (1841-1845)  that  he  was  given  the  Honorary  Degree. 
Born  in  1794 ;  died  in  1865.] 

[3  William  Edward  Jelf,  Greek  Reader  1879 ;  Tutor  1836  to 
1849;  Proctor  1843;  Public  Examiner  1841  to  1855;  Bampton 
Lecturer  1857.  Born  1811 ;  died  1875.] 


OXFORD  67 

unimpaired,  and  conversation  in  the  Common  Room 
was  free.  A  body  of  English  gentlemen,  however 
bigoted,  could  never  have  been  brought  to  hoot  a  guest. 

Academical  duty,  however,  was  lost  in  the  theologi- 
cal fray.  The  teaching  staff  to  a  great  extent  aban- 
doned its  task  to  the  private  coaches.  From  sinking 
into  mere  clericism  the  University  was  saved  only  by 
the  Class  List.  The  University  having  been  absorbed 
by  the  Colleges,  and  the  Professor  having  been  super- 
seded by  the  College  tutor,  the  Professoriate  had  sunk 
into  decrepitude.  Few  of  the  Professors  except  the 
Professor  of  Theology,  lectured,  and  if  they  did  the 
attendance  was  very  small.  Buckland  *  lectured  on 
geology,  of  which  he  with  Sedgwick  2  and  Murchison 
was  a  pioneer.  I  attended  his  course,  and  could  not 
help  marking  the  shifts  to  which  he  was  driven  in  his 
effort  to  reconcile  geology  with  Genesis.  The  effort 
now  is  to  reconcile  Genesis  with  geology. 

Dr.  Arnold  3  held  the  chair  of  Modern  History,  to 
which  he  had  been  appointed  by  a  Whig  Government. 
His  coming  to  deliver  his  course  was  a  grand  event. 
His  name  was  a  horror  and  a  terror  to  the  dominant 
High  Church  party.  Turnus  was  appearing  once  more 
in  the  camp  of  ^Eneas.  His  lectures,  however,  were 

f1  William  Buckland  (1784-1856),  Professor  of  Mineralogy ; 
Reader  in  Geology ;  Canon  of  Christ  Church ;  Dean  of  Westminster ; 
President  of  the  Geological  Society  in  1824  and  1840.] 

[2  Adam  Sedgwick  (1785-1873),  Woodwardian  Professor  of  Geol- 
ogy at  Cambridge  1818 ;  President  of  the  Geological  Society  1831.] 

[3  Thomas  Arnold,  the  Head  Master  of  Rugby ;  Regius  Professor 
of  Modern  History  at  Oxford  1841.] 


fll 


68  REMINISCENCES 

crowded.  The  success,  professional  and  personal,  was 
complete.  The  description  of  the  blockade  of  Genoa 
drew  tears  from  the  eyes  of  Heads  of  Houses.  The 
audience  felt  that  they  were  looking  on  a  hero.  And 
a  true  hero  Thomas  Arnold  was. 

Our  curriculum  was  classical,  mathematics  holding 
a  very  secondary  place,  though  a  double  first,  that  is,  a 
first-class  both  in  classics  and  mathematics,  was  the 
summit  of  honour ;  classical  distinction  was  the  general 
road  to  such  prizes  open  to  merit  as  there  were.  Our 
classical  course,  however,  included  Aristotle,  Plato 
for  those  who  chose,  and  Butler  by  way  of  supplement, 
together  with  logic  and  ancient  history.  Aristotle 
was  studied  in  a  scholastic  way  and  without  distinction 
between  the  genuine  and  spurious  books  of  the  Ethics. 
Still  the  study  was  intercourse  with  a  great  intelligence. 
It  kindled  an  interest  in  the  problems  of  humanity. 

I  tried  for  honours,  and  won  them.  But  I  have  often 
doubted  whether  they  were  a  blessing  to  me.  My  rela- 
tives always  upbraided  me  with  want  of  ambition,  and 
the  charge  was  perfectly  true.  But  my  University 
honours  thrust  upon  me  at  the  outset  a  sort  of  distinc- 
tion, which,  as  I  was  unambitious,  has  been  the  source 
of  more  pain  than  pleasure.  My  great  pleasures  have 
always  been  domestic,  and  I  should  have  been  happier 
,in  a  perfectly  private  and  tranquil  walk  of  life. 

Whether  the  system  of  competitive  examinations  is 
good  is  a  moot  question.  Love  of  the  study  is  of  course 
far  better  as  a  motive.  But  love  of  study  is  not  uni- 


OXFORD  69 

versal.  Lord  Althorp,1  one  of  the  best  and  most  useful 
of  English  statesmen,  owned  that  he  would  have  re- 
mained a  mere  sportsman  had  he  not  been  spurred  to 
intellectual  exertion  by  his  mother's  desire  that  he 
should  succeed  in  a  College  competition.  In  this  case, 
however,  the  studies  were  gymnastic.  Bread-and- 
butter  studies,  now  in  the  ascendant,  ought  to  draw 
of  themselves. 

The  life  of  the  ordinary  Undergraduate  has,  I  believe, 
become  softer,  more  refined,  and  more  luxurious  than 
it  was  in  my  day.  Wine  parties,  which  were  our  social 
meetings,  have,  I  am  told,  gone  out  of  fashion.  The 
sound  of  the  piano  is  now  common  in  College  Quad- 
rangles ;  it  was  hardly  ever  heard  in  my  day.  Rooms 
are  said  to  be  more  elegantly  and  tastefully  furnished. 
On  the  other  hand,  athletics  have  assumed  monstrous 
proportions.  Football  in  my  time  was  never  played 
by  any  adults  but  the  roughs  in  the  North,  and  when 
we  played  it  at  Eton  only  the  ball  was  kicked,  whereas 
everything  now  is  kicked  but  the  ball.  Yet  we  are  told 
that  character  is  less  masculine  than  it  was.  Nor  is 
this  a  paradox.  Athletic  force  is  muscular,  not  moral. 

Among  the  incidents  not  to  be  forgotten  of  Oxford 
Undergraduate  life  were  the  Long  Vacation  reading 
parties.  I  have  a  pleasant  recollection  of  the  days 
spent  with  chosen  companions  at  Filey,  then  a  small 
village,  with  its  spacious  beach  and  the  amphitheatre 

P  John  Charles  Spencer,  Viscount  Althorp  and  third  Earl  Spen- 
cer. 1782-1845.] 


70  REMINISCENCES 

of  rock  into  which  the  Northern  Sea  grandly  rolls; 
amidst  the  beautiful  scenery  of  Linton;  or  beside 
Grasmere  lying  in  the  quiet  urn  of  its  green  hills.  It 
was  when  we  were  in  Devonshire  that  a  trial  took  place 
closely  resembling  the  Tichborne  case.  The  title  and 
estate  of  an  infant  Baronet  were  claimed  by  an  impostor 
who  pretended  that  he  was  the  child  of  a  secret  mar- 
riage. The  impostor,  like  the  Tichborne  claimant/  had 
got  up  his  case  with  care ;  and  at  the  trial  things  were 
going  well  for  him  when  word  came  to  the  counsel  on 
the  other  side  that  a  seal  tendered  by  him  as  a  proof  of 
family  identity  had  been  manufactured  for  him  a  few 
weeks  before  in  a  London  shop.  The  fact  was  sprung 
upon  him;  he  collapsed  under  it,  and  in  a  few  weeks 
was  in  Dartmoor  gaol.  The  case  created  local  excite- 
ment and  no  more.  The  Tichborne  case  set  the 
whole  country  in  a  blaze,  divided  families,  and  it  was 
thought  would  have  divided  the  nation  had  a  general 
election  then  taken  place.  So  much  more  inflammable 
and  excitable  has  the  electric  telegraph  made  the  public 
mind.  Such  now,  if  a  Tichborne  case  could  divide 
the  nation,  is  government  by  the  people. 

Among  my  notable  contemporaries,  besides  Coning- 
ton,  were  Matthew  Arnold  2  and  Freeman.  Matthew 

P  The  celebrated  Tichborne  case  lasted  from  May  the  llth,  1871, 
to  February  the  28th,  1874.  The  claimant's  name  was  Arthur 
Orton.] 

[2  Matthew  Arnold,  the  poet  and  critic,  was  born  in  1822 ;  was  a 
Master  at  Rugby ;  then  Private  Secretary  to  the  Marquess  of 
Lansdowne ;  then  an  Inspector  of  Schools.  He  died  in  1888.] 


OXFORD  71 

Arnold  was  outwardly  a  singular  contrast  to  his  almost 
terribly  earnest  sire.  Not  that  he  was  by  any  means 
without  serious  purpose,  especially  in  his  province  of 
education.  His  outward  levity  was  perhaps  partly  a 
mask,  possibly  in  some  measure  a  recoil  from  his  father's 
sternness.  As  we  were  travelling  together  in  a  railway 
carriage,  I  observed  a  pile  of  books  at  his  side. 
" These,"  said  he,  with  a  gay  air,  "are  Celtic  books 
which  they  send  me.  Because  I  have  written  on  Celtic 
Literature,  they  fancy  I  must  know  something  of  the 
language."  His  ideas  had  been  formed  by  a  few  weeks 
at  a  Welsh  watering-place.  He  exerted,  however, 
unquestionably  an  elevating  and  liberalizing  influence 
on  a  large  class  of  minds.  He  pierced  the  hide  of  Phi- 
listinism with  the  silvery  shafts  from  his  bow,  though 
his  idea  of  Philistinism  may  not  always  have  been 
perfectly  just.  But  in  all  fields,  social  or  theological 
as  well  as  literary,  taste  was  supreme  in  his  mind.  If 
there  is  nothing  disparaging  in  the  phrase,  I  should  say 
that  he  was  the  prince  of  connoisseurs.  Freeman  1 
was  a  follower  of  Newman,  and  the  leading  spirit  of  the 
Oxford  Architectural  Society,  which  conducted  the 
aesthetic  part  of  the  medieval  revival.  He  and  I  be- 
came great  friends  in  after  years,  when  he  was  living 
as  a  Thane  on  his  paternal  Allod  at  Somerleaze,  near 
Wells.  He  was  very  happy  when  he  was  made  a  Justice 


P  Edward  Augustus  Freeman,  the  historian  of  the  Norman 
Conquest,  was  born  in  1823,  and  was  Regius  Professor  of  Modern 
History  at  Oxford  from  1884  till  his  death  in  1892.] 


72  REMINISCENCES 

of  the  Peace.  There  are  different  versions  of  the  story 
of  his  having  been  toasted  at  an  Architectural  Society's 
dinner  as  one  "  singularly  familiar  with  the  manners 
of  our  rude  ancestors."  But  it  was  mere  brusqueness, 
not  insolence.  From  insolence  he  was  entirely  free. 
In  America  he  probably  counted  too  much  on  the  sim- 
plicity of  Republican  fashions,  a  mistake  into  which 
the  English  visitor  is  apt  to  fall.  As  a  historian, 
though  diffuse  in  style  and  somewhat  pedantic,  he  will 
always  be  master  of  his  period.  He  was  profoundly 
learned,  strictly  accurate,  and,  though  he  had  his  predi- 
lections, thoroughly  honest.  He  loved  truth  and  hated 
falsehood,  loved  righteousness  and  hated  iniquity. 
Hence  he  dealt  rudely  with  the  worshipper  of  Henry 
VIII,  in  spite  of  Froude's *  literary  charm. 

Temple 2  and  Clough  were  rather  my  seniors. 
Temple,  making  his  way  upon  the  small  income  of  a 
Tiverton  Scholarship  at  Balliol,  was  respected  as  the 
model  of  a  hard-working  and  self-denying  student. 
He  was  presently  to  contribute  to  that  manifesto  of 
Rationalism,  "Essays  and  Reviews,"  3  which  set  the 
orthodox  world  in  a  flame;  though  in  his  own  essay 
there  was  nothing  specially  to  alarm,  and  in  fact  I 
heard  it  delivered  as  a  University  Sermon  without 

[J  James  Anthony  Froude's  "History  of  England  from  the  Fall 
of  Wolsey  to  the  Defeat  of  the  Spanish  Armada."] 

[2  Frederick  Temple,  was  Head  Master  of  Rugby  from  1858  to 
1869 ;  Bishop  of  Exeter,  then  of  London,  and  then  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury.] 

[3  These  were  published  in  1860.  They  were  condemned  by  Con- 
vocation in  1861  and  1864.] 


OXFORD  73 

disturbing  the  slumber  of  any  of  the  Heads  of  Houses. 
He  became  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  supreme 
guardian  of  the  orthodox  faith.  One  cannot  help 
wondering  what  was  the  mental  process  of  transition. 
Transition  to  some  extent  from  association  with  the 
authors  of ' '  Essays  and  Reviews  "  there  must  have  been. 

Clough,1  Dr.  Arnold's  model  pupil,  seemed  to  me  an 
instance  of  a  moral  overstraining  which  was  a  liability 
of  Arnold's  system.  He  came  up  to  Oxford  a  phi- 
losopher. Ward,  seeing  the  value  of  such  a  recruit  to 
the  Tractarian  party,  got  hold  of  him,  uprooted  his 
existing  beliefs,  but  failed  to  plant  new  beliefs  in  their 
room.  Clough  was  altogether  upset,  and  missed  the 
first-class  which  he  would  otherwise  have  most  easily 
won.  He  went  through  life  with  a  vague  and  hopeless 
yearning  for  truth,  which  seemed  to  be  depicted  in  his 
very  face.  Some  short  poems  and  a  translation  of 
Plutarch  were  the  only  products  of  a  great  intellectual 
power. 

In  those  days  before  University  Reform  the  Fellow- 
ships of  Magdalen  were  divided  among  certain  counties, 
and  there  was  no  prospect  of  a  vacancy  in  my  county. 
I  had  to  seek  a  fellowship  elsewhere.  It  was  with  keen 
regret  that  I  left  Magdalen ;  my  heart  has  always  turned 
to  its  beauty,  and  often  the  sound  of  its  sweet  bells  has 
come  to  me  across  the  ocean.  Reformed  it  had,  in 

'  I1  Arthur  Hugh  Clough,  the  poet,  was  the  son  of  a  Liverpool 
cotton  merchant ;  born  1819 ;  Scholar  of  Balliol ;  Fellow  of  Oriel, 
and  Tutor ;  Principal  of  University  Hall,  London ;  died  1861.] 


74 


REMINISCENCES 


justice  to  the  University  and  the  nation,  to  be ;  and  I 
had  to  bear  a  hand  in  the  process ;  but  I  was  helping  to 
destroy  a  little  Eden  in  a  world  where  there  are  not 
many  of  them.  An  attempt  was  made  by  a  reforming 
party  at  Queen's  to  open  a  Fellowship  and  Tutorship 
for  me  there ;  it  was  defeated,  as  it  was  sure  to  be,  by 
a  combination  of  Anti-reformers  and  Ritualists.  I 
found  a  more  congenial  home  in  University  College. 


GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY  YEARS  OF  AGE. 

Photograph  by  J.  H.  Guggenheim,  Oxford. 


CHAPTER  V 

OXFORD  TUTORSHIP 
1851-1854 

Fellows — Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley — Benjamin  Jowett  —  Thorold 
Rogers  —  Mark  Pattison  —  Sir  Travers  Twiss. 

MY  life  during  the  years  that  followed  was  rather 
a  medley.  I  was  for  a  time  Tutor  at  University  Col- 
lege; was  Assistant  Secretary  to  the  Royal  Commis- 
sion of  Inquiry  into  the  University  of  Oxford;  and 
Secretary  to  the  Parliamentary  Commission  of  Reform 
which  followed  it ;  tried  the  study  of  law  for  a  time  in 
London,  but  found  that  the  profession  would  be  beyond 
my  strength ;  fell  back  on  the  University ;  and  became 
Regius  Professor  of  Modern  History ;  during  my  tenure 
of  which  office  I  was  a  member  of  the  National  Educa- 
tion Commission. 

Fellows  at  Colleges  were  then  all  unmarried  and  lived 
in  College ;  such  of  them  as  were  in  Orders  waiting  for 
College  livings.  We  dined  together  in  Hall,  and  after 
dinner  had  our  chat  round  the  fire  in  Common  Room. 
The  Common  Room  at  University  was  that  in  which 
Johnson  had  often  been  a  guest.  Over  its  mantelpiece 
stood  the  bust  of  Alfred,  our  legendary  founder,  by 

75 


76  REMINISCENCES 

Bacon,1  a  copy  of  which  now  stands  in  the  Hall  devoted 
to  liberal  studies  at  Cornell.  Living  amongst  our 
pupils,  we  saw  a  good  deal  of  them.  The  marriage  of 
Fellows  and  their  residence  out  of  College  must  have 
greatly  loosened  the  old  ties.  This  is  a  pity.  But 
the  change  was  necessary  to  secure  teachers  perma- 
nently devoted  to  their  calling,  which  the  celibate 
Fellows  and  Tutors  of  former  days  could  not  be. 

There  is,  I  believe,  little  difficulty  in  managing  young 
English  gentlemen,  if  they  trust  you  and  know  that 
you  respect  their  feelings.  They  will  bear  reproof 
when  they  are  conscious  that  it  is  deserved,  and  submit 
to  all  that  is  really  necessary  to  the  enforcement  of 
law.  Sarcasm,  which  hurts  their  self-respect,  mistrust 
of  their  word  and  honour,  or  espionage,  they  will  not 
bear.  Of  course  it  is  necessary  to  remember  that  boys 
are  boys,  and  while  you  hold  the  reins  firmly,  not  to 
be  always  pulling  at  the  horse's  mouth.  Tricks  were 
sometimes  played  on  the  Dons,  the  authors  of  which, 
if  you  were  wise,  you  were  not  over-anxious  to  discover. 
From  the  hazing  which  is  the  strange  opprobrium  of 
American  Colleges  we  were  almost  entirely  free.  Once 
an  unpopular  student  of  our  College  was  hazed.  The 
College  officer  who  had  to  deal  with  the  case  said  in 


[l  The  author  probably  refers  to  John  Bacon,  born  1740 ;  died 
1799;  but  Chalmers  (History  of  the  Colleges,  etc.,  i,  36  [1810])  and 
Ingram  (Memorials  of  Oxford,  University  College,  p.  15  [1834]) 
describe  the  bust  as  "carved  by  Wilton  from  a  model  by  Rysbrach." 
It  was  presented  to  the  College  by  Jacob  Pleydell  Bouverie,  Vis- 
count Folkestone,  afterwards  second  Earl  of  Radnor.] 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  77 

effect,  "Boys  will  be  boys,  and  if  you  play  pranks  on 
me  or  my  colleagues  you  will  be  punished  if  we  are  so 
unlucky  as  to  catch  you;  but  we  are  not  insulted. 
Your  fellow-student,  if  you  maltreat  him,  is  insulted. 
We  are  the  guardians  of  the  honour  and  feelings  of 
everybody  under  this  roof,  and  we  mean  to  fulfil  our 
trust."  One  appeal  to  good  feeling  was  enough. 

As  Tutor  of  University  I  stepped  into  the  place  of 
Arthur  Stanley,1  whose  name,  in  those  days  great,  and 
to  High  Churchmen  terrible,  is  now  almost  forgotten, 
while  the  progress  of  the  Higher  Criticism  has  left 
the  most  daring  of  his  heresies  far  behind. 

Stanley's  influence  as  a  theologian  and  a  religious 
philosopher,  never  very  great,  apart  from  the  charm 
of  his  personal  character,  has  ceased.  His  best  works 
are  his  "Life  of  Arnold,"  his  historical  lectures,  and  his 
"Sinai  and  Palestine."  The  work  last  mentioned 
called  forth  his  utmost  enthusiasm  and  gave  the  fullest 
scope  for  the  display  of  his  special  gift,  the  historical 
picturesque.  In  the  lectures  on  the  Eastern  Church 
he  shows  his  ardent  historical  sympathies,  his  power 
of  delineating  historical  character,  his  comprehensive- 
ness of  view,  and  the  picturesque  vivacity  of  his  style. 
His  lectures  on  the  Jewish  Church  lack  a  critical  basis 
and  strictness  of  critical  treatment  altogether.  The 
lecturer  too  often  escapes  from  a  critical  difficulty  into 

P  Best  known  perhaps  as  Dean  of  Westminster,  a  post  he  held 
from  1864  till  his  death  in  1881.  He  was  born  in  1815 ;  became 
Canon  of  Canterbury  in  1851 ;  and  Professor  of  Ecclesiastical 
History  at  Oxford  in  1856.] 


78  REMINISCENCES 

preaching.  To  account  for  the  subsistence  of  the  Israel- 
ites during  forty  years  in  the  wilderness,  with  the  min- 
imum of  miracle,  he  labours  to  make  out  that  the  desert 
may  once  have  been  less  barren ;  a  desperate  hypothesis 
if  carried  to  the  necessary  extent.  The  historian  who 
tries  to  sit  between  the  two  stools,  miracle  and  myth, 
comes  to  the  ground.  The  case  is  even  worse  when  the 
lecturer  has  to  deal  with  the  moral  difficulties,  such  as 
the  massacre  of  the  Canaanites,  the  slaying  of  Sisera, 
and  David's  death-bed  legacy  of  vengeance. 

Stanley  was  wanting  in  the  power  of  strict  and 
patient  investigation,  in  the  critical  faculty,  in  force  to 
grasp,  almost  in  desire  of  grasping,  positive  and  definite 
truth.  He  could  scarcely  even  understand  the  need  of 
positive  and  definite  truth  felt  by  ordinary  natures, 
which  had  no  golden  cloud  of  historical  sympathy  and 
religious  eclecticism  wherein  to  float.  Hence  he  over- 
rated the  efficacy  of  the  oil  which,  in  a  truly  Evangelical 
spirit,  he  poured  upon  the  troubled  waters.  He  says 
that  the  writer  of  Genesis  did  not  mean  to  teach  us 
geology,  but  only  the  relation  of  man  to  his  Creator. 
The  writer  of  Genesis,  however,  did  teach  us  geology, 
at  least  cosmogony,  and  his  apologists  are  driven  to 
saying  in  effect  that  the  Creator,  in  dictating  an  account 
of  his  own  work,  though  not  scientifically  right,  was 
very  nearly  right,  and  almost  anticipated  the  nebular 
hypothesis.  It  might  be  asked,  too,  whether  the  crea- 
tion of  Adam  and  Eve  does  not  concern  the  relation  of 
man  to  the  Creator. 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  79 

Stanley's  theory  of  Church  and  State  was  derived 
not  so  much  from  Hooker,1  to  whom  his  biographer 
ascribes  it,  as  from  Arnold,  who  again  seems  to  hare 
derived  it  from  the  Greek  commonwealths,  the  study 
of  which  was  his  delight.  Arnold  failed  to  observe 
that  though  the  Athenian  Commonwealth  had  a  State 
religion  to  which  Socrates  sacrificed,  the  religion  of 
Socrates  was  outside  that  of  the  State,  and  brought  him 
to  a  martyr's  doom.  Stanley,  like  Arnold,  desired  tint 
Church  and  State  should  be  one.  In  strange  practical 
contrast  to  his  general  liberalism,  Stanley  was  an 
almost  fanatical  upholder  of  Church  Establishments. 
He  went  the  length  of  feeling  a  qualified  sympathy 
even  with  *  Bluidy  Mackenzie.'  He  had  persuaded  him- 
self that,  under  the  free  system,  there  would  be  more  of 
sectarian  bitterness  and  mutual  persecution.  But  he 
had  only  to  look  across  the  Atlantic  to  see  that  there 
would  be  nothing  of  the  kind,  and  that  you  might  have 
a  Christian  nation  without  a  State  Church.  Strange 
to  saypwhen  he  visited  America  he  seemed  to  miss  the 
significance  of  what  he  saw,  and  to  identify  himself 
with  the  Episcopal  Church  alone.  As  a  Liberal, 
Stanley  belonged  himself  to  one  of  the  Church  parties, 
and  could  not  help  at  last  being  drawn  from  his  chosen 
position  of  mediator  and  peacemaker  into  the  party 
fray.  When  he  was  in  it,  he  fought  like  a  gamecock, 
and  developed  unexpected  powers  as  an  oratorical 

I1  Richard  Hooker,  the  author  of  "The  Laws  of  Eodaaastieall 

Politic."] 


r\£u»-^ 


80  REMINISCENCES 

gladiator  in  the  debates  of  Convocation,  though  he 
always  bore  himself  as  became  a  single-hearted  cham- 
pion of  truth  and  justice,  never  descending  to  virulence 
or  faction.  He  now  threw  back  his  mantle  of  half 
orthodoxy,  and  stood  revealed  to  High  Churchmen  and 
Evangelicals  as  the  horrid  thing  he  was.  Their  dread 
of  him  was  ludicrous.  Of  course  flowers  were  scattered 
on  him  by  orthodoxy.  He  was  told  that  his  conduct 
"was  scarcely  reconcilable  with  the  most  fundamental 
principles  of  morality";  that  "if  he  had  behaved  with 
like  profligacy  in  the  service  of  an  earthly  sovereign  he 
would  have  been  tried  by  court-martial  and  shot " ;  and 
that  he  had  committed  "a  graver  offence  than  the  tutor 
who  corrupts  his  pupil's  mind  or  the  trustee  who  robs  the 
widow  and  orphan  of  their  property."  This,  though  his 
enemies  did  not  know  that  he  had  administered  the 
Sacrament  to  such  an  arch-heretic  as  Mrs.  Annie  Besant 1 
and  witnessed  a  Spanish  bull-fight  on  a  Sunday ! 

The  dust  of  these  furious  controversies  has  now  been 
gathered  into  a  narrow  urn.  Stanley  describes  the 
rumour  of  Newman's  secession  to  Rome  as  producing 
an  effect  like  that  of  the  crack  of  doom.  It  seemed, 
he  said,  that  the  sun  was  about  to  hide  its  rays  and  that 
darkness  was  falling  on  the  scene.  To  us  the  confluence 
of  Newmanism  with  Romanism  seems  as  natural  as 
the  confluence  of  two  drops  of  water  on  a  window-pane, 
and  perhaps  fraught  with  consequences  little  more 

P  President  of  the  Theosophical  Society.  Author  of  numerous 
works.  Born  in  1847.] 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  81 

momentous  to  humanity.  We  have  far  other  questions 
now  before  us. 

What  Stanley  did  practically  towards  liberalizing 
theology  was  done,  not  so  much  by  his  theological 
arguments,  as  indirectly  by  his  treatment  of  Bible 
history.  As  his  biographer  says,  he  brought  semi- 
mythical  personages  and  events  down  to  a  human  level. 
He  carried  on,  and  pretty  well  completed,  the  work 
begun  by  Milman,  who,  daring  in  his  day,  first  designated 
the  Father  of  the  Faithful  as  a  Sheikh. 

I  must  not  forget  Stanley's  high  claims  as  a  bio- 
grapher, in  which  character  he  first  won  distinction, 
and  is  to  many,  perhaps,  still  best  known.  His  "Life  . !  •  • 

of  Arnold  "  is  a  noble,  and  no  doubt  in  the  main  a  true, 

C^- 
picture  of  a  genuine  hero.    Though  panegyrical,  as  a 

Life  written  by  a  friend  and  disciple  must  be,  it  is  not 
slavish,  any  more  than  was  Stanley's  devotion  to  Arnold 
himself.  The  Life  is  no  doubt  true,  I  say,  in  the  main. 
There  was  something  in  Arnold's  character,  as  there  is 
something  in  his  face,  which  a  pupil  who  lay  in  his 
master's  bosom  could  hardly  see.  Stanley  was  never 
a  schoolboy;  at  Rugby,  though  neither  unsocial  nor 
unpopular,  he  lived  apart.  He  tells  us  that  the  school- 
world  of  "Tom  Brown  "  was  an  absolute  revelation  to 
him,  opening  up  a  world  of  which,  though  so  near  him, 
he  was  utterly  ignorant.  Nor  could  he  well  be  sensible 
of  any  tendency  in  Arnold's  monitorial  system  to  make 
boys  prematurely  sage. 
Stanley's  Oxford  prize  poem,  "The  Gypsies,"  rises 


82  REMINISCENCES 

far  above  the  prize  poem  level,  and  promises  a  real,  if 
not  a  great,  poet.  This  promise  he  never  fulfilled.  It 
is  strange  that  he  should  have  entirely  lost,  if  ever  he 
had  it,  a  sense  of  music,  art,  and  scenery;  that  he 
should  have  seen  nothing  in  the  glorious  Alps  but 
"unformed  and  unmeaning  lumps,"  and  found,  maugre 
Ruskin,  no  beauty  or  attempt  at  beauty  in  the  interior 
of  St.  Mark's.  He  had  no  ear  for  music,  yet  between 
him  and  its  Queen,  Jenny  Lind,  there  was  an  almost 
passionate  friendship. 

"A  quaint  pathetic  helplessness  in  practical  matters 
that  proved  at  once  attractive  and  endearing"  was 
characteristic  of  Stanley,  and  is  ascribed  by  the  bio- 
grapher to  the  petting  care  with  which  he  was  always 
treated  by  his  domestic  circle.  But  surely  it  must  have 
been  natural  and  not  unconnected  with  his  want  of 
accuracy  in  investigation.  He  never  could  do  a  rule- 
of-three  sum,  and  when  he  voted  for  Mill,  who  held  that 
the  power  of  doing  a  rule-of-three  sum  ought  to  be  a 
qualification  for  the  suffrage,  he  said  that  he  had  been 
voting  for  his  own  disfranchisement.  His  handwriting 
was  the  despair  of  postmen  and  printers.  A  letter 
addressed  by  him  to  Dublin  found  its  way  to  Bath. 
His  "here  we  caught  our  first  view  of  Jerusalem  "  was 
printed  "here  we  caught  our  first  view  of  Jones."  A 
highly  confidential  letter  intended  for  the  Liberal 
Bishop  Thirlwall  *  he  misdirected  to  the  High  Church 

[l  Bishop  of  St.  David's.  1797-1875.  —  But  Stanley  exculpates 
himself.  See  Prothero  and  Bradley 's  "  Life,"  I,  442.] 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  83 

Bishop  Wilberforce,  with  ludicrous  results.  As  Dean 
of  Westminster,  while  he  was  a  most  admirable  custos 
of  the  Abbey,  he  seems  to  have  been  a  poor  custos  of 
its  estate.  But  his  want  of  aptitude  for  business,  and 
his  natural  distaste  for  it,  enhance  the  merit  of  his 
readiness  to  undertake  such  a  post  as  that  of  secretary 
of  the  Oxford  Commission,  and  lay  aside  his  congenial 
work  for  it  when  what  he  deemed  his  duty  called. 
He  lived,  if  ever  a  man  did,  not  for  himself,  but  to  do 
good.  S>int  animae  nostrae  cum  illo. 

I  was  also  intimate  with  Stanley's  illustrious  yoke- 
fellow Jowett,1  about  whom,  since  his  death,  much 
has  been  written.  He  was  a  far  deeper  and  more  ac- 
curate scholar  than  Stanley,  as  a  comparison  of  his 
" Romans"  with  Stanley's  " Corinthians"  will  show. 
His  essays  in  the  same  work  evince  great  spiritual 
insight  and  sympathy  as  well  as  literary  grace.  But 
there  was  no  clinch  in  his  mind.  He  would  have 
doubted  and  kept  other  people  doubting  forever. 
Whatever  was  advanced,  his  first  impulse  was  always 
to  deny.  Doubt  is  better  than  credulity  only  so  long 
as  you  are  pushing  on  to  truth.  Nor  can  I  understand 
how  a  man  could  have  found  it  possible  to  speak  or 
even  to  think  with  perfect  freedom  in  such  a  position 
as  that  of  the  clerical  Head  of  a  College,  performing 
religious  services  and  preaching  in  the  College  Chapel, 


[l  Benjamin  Jowett,  Master  of  Balliol  College,  Oxford,  and  trans- 
lator of  Plato.  Regius  Professor  of  Greek  at  Oxford.  Born  1817 ; 
died  1893.] 


84  REMINISCENCES 

when  he  had  ceased  to  believe,  not  only  in  revealed 
religion  and  miracle,  but  apparently  in  the  existence 
of  any  trustworthy  evidence  of  the  personality  and 
teaching  of  Christ.  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  Jowett 
sought  in  translation  a  mental  refuge.  The  result,  no 
doubt,  was  happy  for  those  who  can  read  the  Classics 
only  in  an  English  dress;  though  it  is  difficult  to  pre- 
serve in  a  translation  the  aroma  of  Plato  or  the  fresh- 
ness of  new-born  philosophy  struggling  to  express  itself 
which  engages  us  in  Thucydides.  Jowett  did  great 
things  for  Balliol  and  the  University.  Men  afterwards 
eminent  owed  to  him  the  awakening  and  direction  of 
their  intellectual  life. 

Another  Liberal  notability,  though  in  a  very  different 
line  and  style,  was  Thorold  Rogers,1  Professor  of  Politi- 
cal Economy,  with  his  burly  frame,  his  voice  of  thunder, 
his  headlong  Radicalism,  and  his  rollicking  good  hu- 
mour. He  was  a  satirist  as  well  as  an  economist. 
Stubbs 2  and  Freeman  were  mutual  admirers. 

The  most  remarkable  figure  in  our  circle  was  perhaps 

that  of  Mark  Pattison.3     He  had  once  been  an  ardent 

...  jrb  follower  of  Newman.    It  was  said  that  he  had  escaped 

secession  only  by  missing  a  train.     He  had,  however, 

I *K  JU 

I1  James  Edwin  Thorold  Rogers,  first  Tooke  Professor  of  Statistics 
,  and  Economic  Science  at  King's  College,  London ;  then  Drummond 

Professor  of  Political  Economy,  Oxford ;  M.P.  for  Southwark,  and 
afterwards  for  Bermondsey ;  published  many  works.  1823-1890.] 

[2  William  Stubbs,  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  successor  in  the  Chair 
of  Modern  History  at  Oxford.  He  was  nominated  Bishop  of  Ox- 
ford in  1888.] 

[3  Rector  of  Lincoln  College,  Oxford.     Born  1813 ;  died  1884.] 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  85 

missed  that  train  with  a  vengeance,  and  had  become 
a  notable  specimen  of  the  recoil ;  though  once  when  he 
preached  before  the  University  there  seemed  to  me  to 
be  something  like  a  regurgitation  of  the  asceticism  of 
his  Newmanite  days.  In  his  case,  as  in  that  of  Jowett, 
one  could  not  help  wondering  how  an  Agnostic  could 
hold  the  office  and  perform  the  religious  functions  of  a 
clerical  Head  of  a  College.  Pattison  was  profoundly 
learned,  rigorously  accurate,  and  a  Draconian  critic. 
His  talk,  when  he  was  in  the  right  vein,  was  highly 
instructive  and  amusing,  with  touches  of  rather  grim 
humour.  He  was  the  chief  of  a  party  called  "  Re- 
searchers," who  held  that  the  proper  function  of  a 
University  was  not  teaching,  but  research,  for  which 
holders  of  University  emoluments  ought  to  be  left 
perfectly  free  from  fixed  duties.  He  was  himself  not  a 
happy  example  of  his  system,  since  as  a  tolerably  active 
College  Tutor  he  had  produced  his  excellent  Life  of 
Casaubon,  while  as  the  holder  of  a  College  Headship 
which  was  almost  a  sinecure  and  was  by  him  made 
entirely  one,  he  produced  nothing  of  more  consequence 
than  newspaper  reviews,  a  short  biography  of  Milton, 
and  a  school  edition  of  Pope's  "Essay  on  Man."  That 
there  was  an  unpleasant  element  in  his  character, 
passages  in  his  Memoirs 1  show.  If  there  are  such  things 
in  the  manuscript  which  he  has  deposited  with  the 
Curators  of  the  Bodleian  for  future  publication,  the 

t1  "  Memoirs."    By  Mark  Pattison.      Late  Rector  of  Lincoln 
College,  Oxford.    London  :  Macmillan"and  Co.  1885.] 


86  REMINISCENCES 

Curators  ought  to  use  the  knife,  not  allow  themselves 
to  be  made  the  agents  of  posthumous  libel.  How 
Conington  can  have  moved  Pattison's  spleen,  it  is  hard 
to  tell.1  He  was  amiable,  inoffensive,  and  if  he  had 
changed  his  mind  about  religious  questions,  Pattison 
had  done  the  same.  Still  more  discreditable  is  the 
allusion  to  the  misfortunes  of  Dr.  Travers  Twiss,2 
against  whom  Pattison  cherished  a  grudge  for  having 
many  years  before,  as  the  legal  adviser  of  University 
College,  decided  against  him  a  question  of  eligibility 
to  a  Fellowship.  The  case  of  Travers  Twiss  was  one 
which  might  have  moved  even  a  disappointed  candi- 
date's heart  to  pity.  From  the  summit  of  prosperity 
and  reputation  he  was  suddenly  cast  down  by  the  dis- 
covery of  a  flaw  in  the  pre-nuptial  character  of  his 
wife.  A  scoundrel,  who,  I  heard  with  pleasure,  had 
ended  his  days  in  a  Work-House,  being  acquainted  with 
Lady  Twiss's  history,  blackmailed  her  and  her  husband 
till  they  could  bear  it  no  more.  A  prudent  friend 
offered  to  take  the  wicked  blackmailer  out  of  the 
way  by  finding  him  constant  employment  abroad. 
But  they  determined  to  go  into  Court.  Lady  Twiss 

ji1  See  the  "  Memoirs,"  pp.  245  et  seq.] 

[2  Sir  Travers  Twiss  ;  bursar,  tutor,  examiner,  barrister ;  Professor 
of  Political  Economy,  of  International  Law ;  Regius  Professor  of 
Civil  Law  at  Oxford,  1855-1870 ;  Chancellor  of  the  Diocese  of  Lon- 
don ;  etc.  He  married  in  1862  Marie  Pharialde  Rosalind  Van 
Lynseele.  Those  who  desire  to  know  the  details  of  the  "flaw" 
spoken  of  in  the  text,  may  consult  the  Law  Reports  of  the  London 
Times  of  the  second  week  of  March,  1872.  Born  in  1809 ;  died  in 
1897.  The  reference  to  Sir  Travers  Twiss  in  Pattison's  "Me- 
moirs" is  on  pages  176-7.] 


OXFORD  TUTORSHIP  87 

broke  down.  Twiss  had  to  resign  his  Chancellorship 
of  the  Diocese  of  London,  and  was  a  ruined  man.  One 
day  before  his  marriage  I  had  dined  with  him  in  his 
elegant  little  house  in  Park  Lane,  and  quaffed  Cabinet 
Johannisberger,  the  gift  of  Metternich,1  for  service  done 
to  Austria  by  Twiss's  pen.  The  next  time  I  saw  him 
was  in  the  Strand,  some  years  after  his  fall.  I  crossed 
over  to  grasp  his  hand,  but  he  dived  into  the  crowd. 

p  The  Austrian  statesman  and  diplomatist,  Prince  Clemens 
Wenzel  Nepomuk  Lothar  von  Metternich-Winneburg.  1773- 
1859.] 


CHAPTER  VI 

TRAVELS 
1847- 

The   Tyrol  —  Dresden  —  Prague  —  Normandy  —  Guizot  —  Italy 
—  Italian  Exiles  —  Louis  Blanc. 

OF  course  I  travelled.  Very  limited  the  range  of 
travel  was  compared  with  what  it  is  at  the  present  day. 
On  the  other  hand,  when  I  and  my  companions  rambled 
over  Switzerland,  Tyrol,  and  the  Southern  slopes  of  the 
Alps,  a  faint  hue  of  romance  still  lingered  on  the  knap- 
sack. We  climbed  the  Rigi  on  our  own  feet.  At 
Zermatt,  where  now  are  great  hotels,  the  good  Madam 
Lauber,  in  her  little  wooden  hostelry,  feasted  us  with 
goat's  flesh,  and  when  I  was  out  late  at  night  sent  her 
ostler  with  a  lantern  to  look  for  me  on  the  Alps.  Now 
there  are  great  hotels,  and  there  is  to  be  a  railway  up 
the  Matterhorn.  In  Tyrol  you  lived  for  about  two 
shillings  a  day  in  clean  quarters  with  coarse  but  not 
unwholesome  fare,  and  coffee,  probably  home-grown. 
In  Tyrol,  however,  for  want  of  trained  guides  we  were 
once  near  getting  into  a  scrape.  We  were  to  cross  from 
the  head  of  the  valley  of  the  Inn  into  the  vale  of  Me  ran. 
Our  guide  did  not  know  the  pass,  and  on  the  recommen- 
dation of  the  priest,  at  whose  house,  for  lack  of  an  inn, 

88 


TRAVELS  89 

we  put  up,  we  took  a  peasant  from  the  village.  Late 
in  the  afternoon  we  reached  a  plateau  of  snow  through 
which  we  could  just  wade  and  on  the  other  side  of  which 
was  the  only  descent  to  the  vale  of  Meran.  Just  then 
came  on  a  blinding  snowstorm,  a  thing  bewildering  and 
almost  appalling  in  the  Alps.  The  peasant  lost  heart ; 
refused  to  go  on ;  when  persuaded  to  go  on,  took  to 
his  flask  for  courage,  and  when,  fortunately,  we  had  just 
got  clear  of  the  plateau,  tumbled  over  a  little  precipice 
and  lay  like  one  dead  in  the  snow  beneath.  He  was 
got  down  the  mountain  to  a  spot  where  help  could 
reach  him  from  a  village.  Of  my  knapsack  memories 
the  Lago  d'  Orta  *  with  the  mountain  path  from  Orta 
to  Varallo  is  the  sweetest.  From  the  Dent  de  Jaman 
I  saw  a  magnificent  thunder-storm  between  the  Alps 
and  the  Jura.  The  reverberation  of  the  thunder 
between  the  ranges  hardly  ceased  for  hours.  The  first 
sight  of  the  distant  Alps  seems  to  give  one  a  new  sense. 
Cobden,  whom  Tories  called  "a,  bagman,"  said  to  me 
when  I  was  going  to  America,  "  There  are  two  sublimities 
in  nature,  the  sublimity  of  rest  and  the  sublimity  of 
motion.  The  sunset  Alps  are  the  sublimity  of  rest, 
the  sublimity  of  motion  is  Niagara."  He  would  now 
find  Niagara  turned  into  a  power  and  railroads  running 
up  the  sunset  Alps.  No  wonder  Switzerland  does  not 
produce  human  poets  in  face  of  such  transcendent  poe- 
try of  nature.  A  spiritual  philosophy  is  more  likely 
to  be  born  in  sight  of  the  Alps  than  a  school  of  poetry. 
P  (?)  Laguna  d'  Orta.] 


90  REMINISCENCES 

A  pleasant  summer  I  spent  in  1847  with  an  Oxford 
party  at  Dresden,  where  we  were  then  about  the  only 
English.  We  studied  German  in  the  morning;  dined 
at  the  Bruhlsche  Terrasse  at  noon;  at  six  went  to  the 
theatre,  which  was  excellent.  We  saw  the  "  Merchant 
of  Venice  "  acted  there  for  the  first  time.  The  rapture 
of  the  audience  and  its  enthusiastic  acclaim  of  Shake- 
speare's name  were  delightful.  Often,  of  course,  I 
stood  before  the  Sistine  Madonna.  That,  it  seems  to 
me,  is  the  only  infant  Jesus  with  a  supernatural  look, 
and  it  seemed  to  me  that  the  effect  might  have  been 
produced  by  putting  the  eyes  of  a  man  into  a  child's 
face.  As  to  the  pictures  of  the  Virgin  and  Child  in 
general,  I  must  confess  that  if  there  is  one  thing  of 
which  I  am  more  weary  than  I  am  of  them  it  is  a  picture 
of  the  Holy  Family.  Art  toils  in  vain  to  depict  Deity 
as  a  child  in  a  mother's  arms. 

We  went  up  the  Elbe  to  Prague,  the  city  of  quaint 
magnificence  and  teeming  memories ;  the  most  roman- 
tic being  those  of  Wallenstein.  In  Prague  John  Huss 
reigns  no  more.  He  was  supplanted  by  the  Jesuits 
with  their  St.  John  Nepomuk,1  Queen's  confessor,  and 
martyr,  as  the  Jesuits  say,  to  the  secrecy  of  the  Confes- 
sional, while  the  jealous  King  gave  another  account  of 
the  martyrdom.  My  companion  nearly  won  the  crown 
of  martyrdom  for  himself  and  me  by  striking  the  statue 
of  St.  John  Nepomuk  with  his  umbrella  as  we  crossed 
the  bridge  over  the  Moldau. 

[l  Usually,  I  think,  called  St.  John  of  Nepomuk.] 


TRAVELS  91 

Travelling  is  much  altered  since  those  days.  Going 
from  Ham  to  Hanover  we  had  to  get  into  the  interior 
of  a  crowded  Eilwagen  at  noon  in  burning  weather  and 
to  crawl  amidst  clouds  of  dust  through  the  whole  of 
that  day,  the  following  night,  and  great  part  of  the  next 
day.  I  preserve  to  this  hour  a  grateful  recollection  of 
the  bottle  of  Assmannshauser  with  which  I  refreshed  my- 
self at  Hanover.  The  paragon  of  quick  travelling  was 
the  Mallepost  from  Geneva  to  Paris,  which  took  two  pas- 
sengers in  a  coupe.  At  the  Geneva  Poste  with  the  first 
stroke  of  the  clock  at  4  P.M.  the  wheel  turned.  We 
trotted  up  the  Jura,  had  ten  minutes  for  refreshment 
at  the  top  of  it,  then  galloped  with  successive  relays 
of  neighing  and  kicking  stallions  to  Paris,  having  only 
one  halt  of  a  quarter  of  an  hour  for  refreshment.  We 
were  turned  out  at  the  Paris  Poste  at  one  o'clock  in 
the  morning  of  the  second  day  to  find  our  lodgings  as 
we  could.  My  fellow-traveller  fortunately  had  a  car- 
riage to  meet  him,  in  which  he  kindly  took  me  to  Meu- 
rice's;  otherwise  I  might  have  spent  the  rest  of  the 
night  in  the  yard.  However,  if  travelling  was  less 
easy,  people  were  not  so  restless.  A  man  who  had  a 
holiday  reposed.  The  present  age  is  so  restless  that  it 
can  find  repose  only  in  action.  If  a  man  has  a  holi- 
day, he  sets  out  to  travel  as  far  as  he  can  by  rail, 
encountering  almost  as  many  cares  in  catching  trains, 
looking  after  baggage,  and  getting  rooms  at  hotels,  as 
there  are  in  the  business  for  relief  from  which  he  flies. 

It  was  later  on  that,  feeling  in  need  of  refreshment, 


92  REMINISCENCES 

I  took  a  quiet  carriage  drive  through  Normandy, 
stopping  at  each  place  till  I  had  exhausted  its  antiqui- 
ties and  beauties,  living  at  the  tables  d'hote  of  the  little 
hotels,  and  seeing  something  of  the  people.  I  picked 
up  some  history  by  the  way.  Wide  is  the  gulf  between 
the  France  of  the  days  before  the  Revolution  and  the 
France  of  to-day.  I  came  upon  a  ruined  chateau. 
The  peasants  could  tell  me  nothing  about  it;  did 
not  know  who  had  been  its  lords;  but  said  it  had 
belonged  to  a  Baron  who  shod  his  horses  with  silver. 
Perhaps  the  grandfathers  of  some  of  these  men  had 
stood  bareheaded  at  the  gate  to  see  the  Lord  go  forth. 
In  the  wall  of  the  auberge  was  a  medallion  portrait, 
probably  taken  from  the  chateau.  The  landlady 
could  not  tell  me  whose  it  was,  but  I  thought  I  recog- 
nized the  features  of  Marie- Antoinette. 

On  the  trip  I  fell  in  with  a  young  French  official  who 
was  going  his  rounds.  We  travelled  some  way  together, 
and  a  very  pleasant  companion  he  was.  I  was  struck 
with  his  attitude  towards  the  Church.  He  seemed 
to  have  got  beyond  any  antipathy  to  it,  and  to  regard 
it  with  perfect  indifference,  as  a  thing  with  which  he 
had  no  concern.  I  was  at  the  Church  of  Mont  St. 
Michel  when  a  party  of  peasants  entered.  The  women 
all  went  up  to  the  altar  and  knelt  to  it;  the  men  all 
stood  aloof.  On  the  other  hand  I  had  an  introduction 
to  a  wealthy  gentleman  at  Caudebec  who  was  working 
zealously  for  the  Church.  The  connection  is  every- 
where close  between  religious  and  political  reaction. 


TRAVELS  93 

Zola's  picture  of  the  peasantry  in  "La  Terre  "  did 
not  seem  to  me  to  be  applicable  to  the  Norman  peas- 
ants. Taking  shelter  from  the  rain  in  a  Norman 
cottage,  I  found  what  seemed  to  me,  for  peasants,  opu- 
lence and  civilization.  But  from  what  my  friend  Lady 
Verney,1  a  very  careful  observer,  said,  Zola's  description 
is  true  of  the  peasantry  in  the  South.  A  sorry  result 
of  a  century  of  revolution ! 

In  the  magnificent  churches  of  Caen  you  feel  the 
majesty  of  the  Conqueror.  At  Falaise  the  castle  still 
looks  down  upon  the  tanneries,  as  in  the  days  when 
Robert  the  Devil  wooed  the  tanner's  daughter.  There 
lie  buried  Walter  2  and  Biota,3  reputed  victims  of  the 
Conqueror's  ruthless  ambition.  I  thought  of  the  con- 
cluding words  of  one  of  Halford  Vaughan's  4  lectures 
on  the  Norman  Conquest.  "John,  who  murdered  his 
nephew,  was  weak,  and  he  is  infamous ;  but  if  Walter 

P  Probably  Frances  Parthenope,  eldest  daughter  of  William 
Edward  Nightingale,  and  second  wife  of  Sir  Harry  Verney,  the 
second  Baronet.  She  wrote  "Real  Stories  from  Many  Lands," 
1878;  "Peasant  Properties,  and  other  Selected  Essays,"  2  vols., 
1885 ;"  Cottier  Owners,  Little  Takes  and  Peasant  Properties.  A 
Reprint  of  'Jottings  in  France,  Germany,  and  Switzerland,"' 
1885 ;  and  many  other  books.] 

[2  Walter,  Count  of  Mantes  (and  chosen  Count  of  Maine),  son 
of  Godgifu,  the  daughter  of  King  Ethelred.] 

[*  Biota,  his  wife,  daughter  of  Herbert  Wake-Dog.  —  They  were 
said  to  have  been  poisoned  by  William  the  Conqueror,  while  they 
were  his  guests.  —  See  Freeman's  "The  Norman  Conquest,"  iii, 
139;  iv,  391.  —  For  the  tale  in  brief,  the  general  reader  may  be 
referred  to  Freeman's  "  William  the  Conqueror,"  chap.  iv.  London : 
Macmillan.  1888.  ("Twelve  English  Statesmen"  Series.)] 

[4  Henry  Halford  Vaughan,  Regius  Professor  of  Modern  History 
at  Oxford  from  1848  to  1858.] 


94 


REMINISCENCES 


and  Biota  sleep  in  the  vaults  of  Falaise,  the  horse  of 
William's  equestrian  statue  prances  proudly  over  their 
forgotten  graves." 

I  had  made  the  acquaintance  of  Guizot  *  when  he  was 
an  exile  in  London.  A  note  recalling  our  acquaintance 
brought  a  kind  invitation  to  Val-Richer.  I  found  a 
charming  family  group  assembled  there.  The  fallen 
Minister  was  evidently  happy  in  the  circle  of  home 
affections;  and  I  set  down  his  happiness  as  a  proof 
of  his  having  used  power  on  the  whole  for  good.  So 
I  believe  he  had;  though  his  enemies  might  call  him 
an  austere  intriguer,  and  though  a  stain  was  left  on 
his  career  by  the  Spanish  Marriage  plot;  which,  how- 
ever, was  not  his  work,  but  that  of  his  crafty  master. 
His  talk,  as  we  paced  the  garden  after  breakfast,  was 
mainly  about  the  religious  state  of  Europe.  He 
seemed  to  look  with  complacency  on  the  Papacy  as  a 
conservative  power.  There  had  been  a  division  in  the 
French  Protestant  Church,  in  which  he  was  on  the  con- 
servative side,  while  his  son-in-law  was  on  the  latitudi- 
narian.  Coming  to  the  subject  of  Ireland,  he  stopped 
in  his  walk,  and  with  an  emphatic  wave  of  his  hand 
said,  "The  conduct  of  England  to  Ireland  for  the  last 
thirty  years  has  been  admirable."  I  replied  that  in 
intention  it  had ;  but  that  we  had  still  to  do  away  with 
the  Irish  Church  Establishment.  To  this  he  assented, 
and  then  repeated  what  he  said  before. 


I1  Francois   Pierre    Guillaume    Guizot,    the    celebrated    French 
statesman  and  historian.    1787-1874.] 


TRAVELS  95 

Italy  I  saw  for  the  first  time  with  the  raptures  of  a 
student  of  history,  ancient  and  modern.  I  was  im- 
pressed, of  course,  by  the  luminous  grandeur  of  St. 
Peter's,  but  the  impression  was  not  religious;  it  was 
merely  aesthetic,  and  the  style,  in  strong  contrast  with 
that  of  the  Gothic  Cathedrals  of  Christendom,  seemed 
to  mark  the  distinction  between  the  Papal  autocracy 
and  the  religion  of  Anselm  and  Thomas  a  Kempis.  A 
later  tour  took  in  Ravenna,  on  which  I  looked  as  the 
asylum  of  one  of  the  greatest  of  poets,  but  one  who  at 
the  same  time  had  polluted  imagination  with  the  hateful 
Purgatory  and  Hell,  depicting  God  as  an  almighty 
fiend  torturing  through  all  eternity  for  their  frailty 
beings  whom  he  had  himself  created  frail.  Profoundly 
interesting  is  Syracuse,  specially  to  all  who  read  in  the 
original  the  narrative  by  Thucydides  of  the  retreat  of 
the  Athenians,  which  has  been  called  the  finest  of  all 
narratives  and  is  certainly  among  the  very  finest. 

No  place  took  my  fancy  more  than  Perugia,  enthroned 
upon  its  hill  with  its  glorious  view  over  those  valleys, 
and  with  the  shrine  of  St.  Francis  near.  The  city 
having  become  cramped  and  rather  noisome,  a  new 
quarter  had  been  thrown  out  with  a  new  hotel.  In  the 
hotel-book  was  entered  Ruskin's  name,  with  an 
anathema  against  the  new  quarter  as  a  profanation 
of  history  and  art.  The  censor,  however,  had  put  up 
at  the  new  hotel. 

To  talk  about  Venice  would  be  a  platitude.  About 
St.  Mark's,  beautiful  and  interesting  as  it  is,  Ruskin's 


96  REMINISCENCES 

raptures  seem  to  me  to  be  overdone.  What  impressed 
me  intensely  and  indelibly  was  the  whole  scene.  I 
saw  that  scene  just  in  time,  before  the  Campanile  had 
fallen  and  steam  busses  had  been  put  on  the  Grand 
Canal. 

In  England  in  that  revolutionary  era  I  saw  a  good 
deal  of  the  Italian  exiles,  Mazzini,  Sam,  and  Arrivabene.1 
Mazzini  impressed  me  as  really  noble.  His  mark  was 
humanity,  of  which  he  wished  his  Italy  to  be  a  free  and 
worthy  organ.  He  assured  me  that  he  had  never  been 
concerned  in  any  assassination  plot.  Between  Gari- 
baldi and  me  letters  passed,  and  when  he  visited  Eng- 
land he  was  going  to  visit  Oxford  and  put  up  at  my 
house,  but  a  jealous  fairy  whisked  him  away. 

A  far  more  questionable  servant  of  humanity  was 
Louis  Blanc,2  with  whom  I  sat  on  Richmond  Hill 
through  a  long  summer  afternoon,  talking  of  his  doings 
and  those  of  his  party  in  France.  In  exile  he  was  mod- 
erate, as  well  as  very  lively  and  attractive.  But  it 
seemed  to  me  that  he  had  no  definite  policy,  though  he 
had  strong  feelings,  and  if  the  guillotine  had  been  put 
into  his  hands,  I  am  afraid  he  would  have  used  it.  Here, 

P  Giuseppe  Mazzini,  the  celebrated  Italian  patriot  and  revolu- 
tionary, was  born  in  1808,  and  died  in  1872.  —  Count  Aurelio  Saffi 
was  (with  Mazzini  and  Armellini)  elected  one  of  the  Triumvirate 
of  Rome  in  1849.  —  Count  Carlo  Arrivabene  was  the  author  of 
"An  Epoch  of  my  Life  "  ;  '/The  Urgency  of  the  Venetian  Question  "  ; 
"Italy  under  Victor  Emmanuel,"  etc.] 

[2  Jean  Joseph  Charles  Louis  Blanc,  the  French  politician,  his- 
torian, political  writer,  and  socialist;  the  advocate  of  "National" 
or  "Social,"  "Workshops.'!  Born  1811 ;  died  1882.] 


TRAVELS  97 

however,  was  the  latest  outcome  of  three-quarters  of 
a  century  of  European  revolution,  of  which  the  enor- 
mous carnage  and  incalculable  destruction  were  by  no 
means  the  most  costly  part.  The  most  costly  part 
was  the  effect  on  character,  political  and  social.  Let 

Rus  never  glorify  revolution. 
•4J,  &W1 
1  Of  Louis  Blanc  when  he  was  an  exile  in  England  I 

saw  a  good  deal.  He  was  then  all  gentleness  and  phi- 
lanthropy ;  but  had  he  been  in  power,  I  am  afraid  the 
demagogic  despot,  perhaps  even  the  Terrorist,  would 
have  appeared.  As  we  lay  together  on  the  grass  at 
Richmond  I  might  have  been  taken,  as  a  British  Lib- 
eral, to  symbolize  progress,  while,  after  fierce  con- 
vulsions, a  Reign  of  Terror,  hideous  massacres,  whole- 
sale banishments,  dominations  of  scoundrels,  military 
despotism  with  enormous  sacrifice  of  life  in  the  des- 
pot's wars,  and  a  long  train  of  commotions,  usurpa- 
tions, and  massacre  following,  with  more  civil  war 
and  overthrow  of  free  institutions,  were  represented 
in  Louis  Blanc. 

I1  A  later  addition.] 


CHAPTER  VII 

UNIVERSITY   COMMISSIONS 
1854-1858 

The  Unreformed  University  —  The  Commissioners  —  Dr.  Jeune 
—  Liddell— Tait  —  Johnson— The  Report— The  Bill— The 
Executive  Commission — The  Executive  Commissioners — 
Richard  Bethell,  Lord  Westbury — The  Commissioners'  Report. 

"THAT  which  man  changes  not  for  the  better,  time, 
the  great  innovator,  changes  for  the  worse."  Never 
was  the  truth  of  Bacon's  maxim  more  forcibly  illus- 
trated than  in  the  history  of  the  University  of  Oxford. 
The  Colleges  had  absorbed  the  University,  which  had 
originally  been  free.  The  Statutes  of  the  College  had 
remained  unchanged  from  the  time  of  their  medieval 
founders.  The  Fellowships,  which  were  originally 
provisions  for  poor  students,  but  had  by  the  change  of 
circumstances  become  the  endowments  of  the  teaching 
staff,  were  saddled  with  all  the  preferences  for  birth- 
place, place  of  education,  kinship,  or  poverty,  in  which 
the  partiality  of  a  founder,  in  an  age  little  regardful 
of  differences  of  intellect,  had  thought  it  harmless  to 
indulge.  Oaths  were  taken  to  observe  codes  of  medie- 
val discipline  which  neither  were  nor  could  be  observed. 
All  the  evils  of  which  Adam  Smith  and  Turgot  have 
spoken  as  attaching  to  endowments  displayed  them- 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  99 

selves  in  full  force.  The  Professoriate  was  almost 
dead,  few  of  the  Professors  lecturing,  still  fewer  having 
a  respectable  audience.  Worst  of  all,  perhaps,  the 
Heads  or  Fellows  having  been  required  to  take  Orders 
in  the  days  when  every  scholar  was  a  Clerk,  the  Univer- 
sity and  its  Colleges  had  since  the  Reformation  become 
strictly  clerical,  and  the  University,  instead  of  being 
as  it  had  once  been,  a  place  of  general  learning,  science, 
and  education,  had  become  the  citadel  of  ecclesiasticism 
and  the  arena  of  ecclesiastical  dispute.  Science  was 
exiled.  The  ancient  languages  and  literature  alone  were 
studied.  Even  mathematics  had  but  a  slight  footing 
at  Oxford,  though  Newton  had  made  them  fashionable 
at  Cambridge.  The  University  was  cut  off  from  the 
majority  of  the  people  of  the  United  Kingdom  by 
Anglican  tests,  and  the  Nonconformists  were  despised 
for  their  lack  of  culture,  while  they  were  excluded  from 
L  its  national  seats.  A  reform  had  commenced  at  Oriel 
and  Balliol,  where  conscientious  Heads  had  opened  the 
Fellowships  to  merit.  Little  Dr.  Jenkyns,1  Master  of 
Balliol,  was  a  comic  figure  and  the  subject  of  innumer- 
able jokes.  But  with  all  his  grotesqueness  and  pom- 
posity he  was,  as  Carlyle  says  of  a  reforming  statesman, 
a  good  antiseptic  element  in  his  day.  So  was  Eve- 
leigh  2  the  Provost  of  Oriel.  Oriel  and  Balliol,  how- 
ever, were  small  Colleges,  and  with  them  improvement 

f1  Richard  Jenkyns.  He  was  also  Vice-Chancellor ;  also  Dean  of 
Wells.  1782-1854.] 

[2  John  Eveleigh  was  Provost  from  1781  till  his  death  in  1814. 
He  was  born  in  1748.] 


100  REMINISCENCES 

seemed  to  halt.  It  even  showed  a  tendency  to  recede 
when  Tractarianism,  having  become  dominant,  betrayed 
its  hostility  to  intellect  and  its  determination  to  keep 
the  endowments,  consequently  the  tutorial  staff,  as 
close  as  possible  to  those  whom  it  called  pauperes 
Christi;  in  fact,  to  youths  of  inferior  intellect  and  sub- 
missive character,  such  as  ecclesiastical  leadership 
requires;  while  the  tide  of  ecclesiastical  agitation 
threatened  to  drown  whatever  was  left  of  academical 
interest  and  duty. 

Social  advantages  undoubtedly  there  were,  but  in 
the  way  of  intellectual  gain  all  that  an  Oxford  student 
got  for  three  years  of  his  life  at  a  round  sum  of  money 
was  a  smattering,  soon  forgotten,  of  Greek  and  Latin. 

Mr.  James  Heywood,  a  Nonconformist  Member  of 
Parliament,  was  bringing  forward  an  annual  motion 
for  inquiry  into  the  Universities  mainly  with  a  view 
to  the  abolition  of  religious  tests.  His  motion  was 
regularly  negatived,  being  unsupported  by  the  Liberal 
leaders,  who  saw  no  party  capital  in  University  reform, 
while  they  were  afraid  of  stirring  a  formidable  wasps' 
nest.  A  few  of  us,  Mark  Pattison  and  Jowett  among 
the  number,  met  in  the  rooms  of  Arthur  Stanley  at 
University  College  and  addressed  to  Lord  John  Russell, 
the  head  of  the  Liberal  Government,  a  request  that 
he  would  not  allow  the  occasion  of  Heywood's  motion 
again  to  pass  without  holding  out  hope  of  assistance  to 
University  reform.  In  compliance  with  this  request 
Lord  John  Russell  announced  a  Commission  of  Inquiry 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  101 

into  the  Universities  and  their  Colleges.  The  wasps 
at  once  swarmed  out  upon  him;  Gladstone  denounced 
interference  with  private  foundations;  the  Minister 
seemed  to  waver.  A  series  of  letters  written  to  The 
Times  and  signed  "Oxoniensis,"  taking  Bacon's  maxim 
for  their  test,  were  credited  with  having  helped  to  con- 
firm him  in  his  resolution.  At  all  events  he  persevered, 
and  Royal  Commissions  of  Inquiry,  one  for  Oxford  and 
one  for  Cambridge,  were  appointed. 

The  Oxford  Commissioners  were  Hinds,1  Bishop  of 
Norwich,  a  Whig  prelate,  put  in  the  chair  to  propitiate 
Churchmen;  Tait,2  then  Dean  of  Carlisle,  afterwards 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury;  Dr.  Jeune,3  Master  of  Pem- 
broke College;  Liddell,4  then  Head  Master  of  West- 
minster, afterwards  Dean  of  Christ  Church ;  Dampier,5 
a  lawyer,  to  keep  the  Commission  right  in  its  law; 
Baden  Powell,6  Professor  of  Geometry,  to  represent 
science;  and  George  Henry  Sacheverell  Johnson,7  a 

['  Samuel  Hinds.   1793-1872.] 

[2  Archibald  Campbell  Tait.    1811-1882.] 

[3  Francis  Jeune ;  afterwards  President  of  the  Probate  and 
Divorce  Court ;  created  Baron  Helier  in  1905 ;  died  in  that  year.] 

[4  Henry  George  Liddell,  joint  author,  with  Robert  Scott,  of  the 
Greek  Lexicon.  1811-1898.] 

[5  John  Lucius  Dampier,  son  of  Sir  Henry  Dampier,  the  judge,  at 
this  time  Vice- Warden  of  the  Stannaries  of  Cornwall ;  at  one  time 
Recorder  of  Portsmouth.  1792-1853.] 

P  Baden  Powell,  Savilian  Professor  of  Geometry  at  Oxford. 
1796-1860.] 

[7  George  Henry  Sacheverell  Johnson,  Dean  of  Wells ;    Fellow,       '    &k/6 
Tutor,  and  Dean  of  Queen's  College,  Oxford;    Savilian  Professor 
of  Astronomy,  1839-1842 ;  Whyte  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy, 
1842-1845 ;  F.R.S.,  etc.     1808-1881.] 


</«fc*£)^ 


102  REMINISCENCES 

paragon  of  the  Oxford  Class  list,  of  Queen's  College. 
Stanley  was  Secretary,  and  opened  characteristically 
by  misdirecting  the  letters  to  the  Chancellor  and  the 
Vice-Chancellor  of  the  University;  the  Chancellor 
being  Field  Marshal  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  whom 
Tory  adoration  had  comically  thrust  into  that  place, 
as  he  seemed  to  proclaim  at  his  inauguration  by  making 
false  quantities  in  reading  his  Latin  speech  and  wearing 
his  Academical  cap  wrong  side  before.  I  was  Assistant 
Secretary-Treasurer,  my  services  being  in  request 
because  I  had  studied  for  a  literary  purpose  the  docu- 
mentary history  of  the  Colleges,  to  which,  the  muni- 
ment rooms  of  the  Colleges  hostile  to  the  Commission 
being  closed,  there  was  no  longer  access.  The  Com- 
mission, being  Royal,  not  Parliamentary,  had  no 
compulsory  powers. 

The  most  active  spirit  of  the  Commission  was  Dr. 
Jeune,  the  Master  of  Pembroke.  The  Head  of  a  House, 
to  sit  on  a  Commission  of  Inquiry  to  which  Oxford 
generally  and  his  own  Order  in  particular  were  bitterly 
opposed,  required  courage.  Jeune  had  it.  He  was  a 
man  of  superabundant  energy,  remarkable  acuteness, 
and  lively  wit.  He  had  raised  Pembroke  from  the 
lowest  place  among  the  Colleges  to  a  respectable  posi- 
tion. He  was  a  strict  political  economist,  and  used 
to  say  that  at  the  Day  of  Judgment  he  would  be  able 
to  plead  that  he  had  never  given  a  penny  to  a  beggar. 
He  was,  however,  really  a  very  kind-hearted  man,  and 
would  probably  have  given  the  beggar  twopence.  He 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  103 

was  excellent  company  and  said  good  things.  A  lady 
at  his  table  asked  him  the  delicate  question  on  what 
principle  they  chose  the  Heads  of  Colleges.  "They 
always  take  the  handsomest  man  among  the  Fellows," 
was  his  reply.  "I  should  not  have  thought,"  said  the 
lady,  "that  the  Provost  of  Worcester  had  been  chosen 
on  that  principle."  "Ah!  but  you  have  not  seen  the 
Fellows  of  Worcester." 

Another  important  member  of  the  Commission  was 
Liddell,  joint  author  with  Scott  of  our  Greek  Lexicon. 
He  was  a  man  of  stately  figure,  character,  and  mind; 
an  artist,  drawing  beautifully,  as  well  as  a  great  clas- 
sical scholar  and  a  first-class  in  Mathematics.  He 
sometimes  made  me  think  of  the  union  of  art  and  science 
in  Leonardo  da  Vinci.  It  appears  that  he  had  a  greater 
share  in  the  lexicon  than  his  partner.  But  at  one 
time  we  expected  of  him  something  more  than  a  Lexi- 
con. At  the  height  of  the  Tractarian  movement  he 
preached  one  or  two  liberal  and  philosophical  sermons 
which  seemed  to  open  a  door  and  to  promise  us  a  leader. 
But  he  did  no  more  in  that  line.  Probably  his  intellect, 
like  that  of  Bishop  Thirlwall  and  other  great  Liberals 
in  Orders,  felt  the  pressure  of  the  white  tie. 

With  Tait  I  then  formed  a  friendship  which  happily 
for  me  proved  lasting.  During  one  of  our  visits  to 
England  in  after  years,  my  wife  and  I  were  the  Arch- 
bishop's guests  at  Addington,  and  when  we  took  leave 
of  our  host  he  was  lying  on  a  bed  of  sickness  from  which 
he  hardly  rose  again.  If  ever  I  knew  a  good  man,  he 


104  REMINISCENCES 

was  one.  His  belief  in  his  liberal  evangelicism  was 
thoroughly  sincere,  and  his  sincerity,  combined  with  a 
toleration  as  large  as  the  law  of  his  Church  would  permit, 
and  with  unfailing  courtesy  and  kindness,  carried  him 
safely  through  all  the  difficulties  of  his  position  in  very 
perilous  times.  Nothing  could  be  simpler  than  his 
personal  habits  and  demeanour.  He  had  thoroughly 
endeared  himself  to  the  great  mass  of  the  laity,  who 
looked  upon  him  as  a  wise  and  good  guide.  He  began 
his  career  as  a  Tutor  at  Balliol  College,  and  was  one  of 
the  four  College  Tutors  who  sounded  a  warning  note 
against  Romanizing  tendencies.  Then  he  became  Head 
Master  at  Rugby,  a  place  which  did  not  suit  him  so 
well;  afterwards  Dean  of  Carlisle.  The  loss  of  four 
of  his  children  all  at  once  by  an  epidemic  was  said  to 
have  moved  the  Queen's  maternal  pity  and  led  to  his 
promotion  to  the  Bishopric  of  London,  from  which 
he  went  to  Canterbury.  If  this  was  so,  Her  Majesty 
had  far  better  reason  for  her  action  than  she  knew. 

Johnson,  of  Queen's,  was  a  man  of  the  finest  intellect 
and  the  broadest  culture.  As  an  undergraduate  he 
had  been  the  first  of  his  day  both  in  classics  and  mathe- 
matics. Great  things  were  expected  of  him.  But  he 
had  spent  his  strength  in  University  competitions,  and 
was  a  warning  to  ambitious  students  of  that  danger. 
As  a  Fellow  of  a  wealthy  College,  condemned  by  medie- 
val statutes,  or  at  least  by  a  custom  supposed  to  be 
founded  on  them,  to  miserable  Trulliberism  and  use- 
lessness,  he  had  been  personally  impressed  with  the 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  105 

need  of  reform.  He  was  presently  made  Dean  of 
Wells,  and  I  spent  many  happy  days  with  him  and  his 
lovely  wife  under  the  roof  of  the  old  Deanery  in  that 
city  of  ecclesiastical  beauty,  history,  and  repose.  Has 
the  tide  of  change  and  unrest  yet  disturbed  the  peace- 
fulness  of  Wells  ? 

The  Commission  of  Inquiry,  in  spite  of  all  obstruc- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  close  Colleges'  resistance,  pro- 
duced an  unanswerable  Report ;  and  to  carry  its  recom- 
mendations into  effect  Parliament  passed  an  Act  ap- 
pointing an  executive  Commission,  to  which  there  were  J  ^ 
two  Secretaries,  Wayte,1  afterwards  President  of  Trin- 
ity College,  who  represented  High  Church  conservatism, 
and  myself.  Gladstone,  by  this  time,  after  hovering 
between  Conservatism  and  Liberalism,  had  alighted  on 
the  Liberal  side.  As  second  in  command  to  Lord  Rus- 
sell in  the  Commons  he  not  only  approved  but  framed 
the  Bill,  and  with  all  his  power  of  exposition  and  com- 
bative energy  pushed  it  through  the  House.  One 
morning  I  went  to  him  at  ten  o'clock  to  help  in  settling 
the  details  of  the  Bill.  He  said  that  he  had  been  at 
work  on  it  till  a  very  late  hour  on  the  previous  night. 
We  worked  at  it  all  day,  Gladstone  only  leaving  me  for 
about  an  hour  and  a  half  to  attend  a  Privy  Council. 
At  six  I  was  very  glad  to  get  away  to  my  Club.  Glad- 
stone went  down  to  the  House,  where  he  made  a  speech 

I1  Samuel  William  Wayte ;  scholar,  fellow,  rhetoric  lecturer, 
tutor,  dean,  bursar,  and  then  President  of  Trinity  College,  Oxford. 
1820-1878.] 


106  REMINISCENCES 

at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning.  The  Bill  was  a  good 
deal  cut  up  by  adverse  amendments  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  Disraeli  doing  his  worst,  and  some  Radi- 
cals ignorantly  playing  into  his  hands.  When  the  Bill 
got  to  the  Lords,  Lord  Derby,1  who  was  Chancellor  of 
Oxford,  made  a  pretty  stiff  speech  against  it.  But 
when  he  sat  down,  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  2  came  over 
to  me  and  said  that  he  thought  that  there  would  be  no 
real  opposition,  as  there  had  apparently  been  no  Whip 
on  the  side  of  the  Conservatives  and  they  were  in  a 
minority.  Lord  Derby,  as  a  man  of  sense,  was  probably 
content  with  a  decent  show  of  resistance,  being  con- 
scious of  the  weakness  of  his  case,  and  having  early  in 
life  committed  himself  against  the  religious  or  rather 
chapel-going  part  of  the  Oxford  system.  I  ventured 
to  suggest  that,  having  a  majority  present,  the  Govern- 
ment might  grasp  the  opportunity  of  reversing  the 
Commons'  amendments  and  restoring  the  integrity  of 
the  Bill.  I  said  that  when  the  Bill  went  down  again 
to  the  Commons  the  Radicals  might  be  better  advised 
than  they  were  before,  and  that,  as  the  end  of  the 
Session  drew  near,  Opposition  members  were  likely 
as  usual  to  be  out  of  Town.  Lord  John  Russell 3  on 
being  consulted,  condemned  my  proposal  as  rash  and 
fraught  with  risk  to  the  Bill.  Gladstone  was  laid  up 
with  chicken-pox;  but  on  an  appeal  being  made  to 

P  Edward  George  Geoffrey  Smith  Stanley,  fourteenth  Earl  of 
Derby.   1799-1869.] 

P  The  fifth  Duke.    1811-1864.] 
[3  First  Earl  Russell.] 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  107 

him  gave,  as  might  have  been  expected,  the  order  for 
battle.  I  had  the  pleasure  of  witnessing  a  succession 
of  divisions  by  which  the  whole  set  of  hostile  amend- 
ments was  reversed.  When  the  Bill  went  down  again 
to  the  Commons,  the  result  was  what  I  had  hoped  it 
would  be,  and  the  integrity  of  the  Bill  was  restored. 

The  work  of  the  Executive  Commission  1  was  heavy 
and  delicate ;  negotiations  having  to  be  carried  on  with 
all  the  Colleges,  some  of  which  were  still  in  a  by  no 
means  friendly  frame  of  mind.  The  chairman  was 
Lord  Ellesmere,2  a  literary  grandee ;  the  other  members 
were  Lord  Harrowby ; 3  Longley,4  Bishop  of  Ripon  and 
afterwards  Archbishop  of  Canterbury;  Sir  George 
Cornewall  Lewis ; 5  Sir  John  Coleridge,6  the  Judge,  of 
whom  more  hereafter;  Sir  John  Awdry,7  and  Mr. 
Edward  Twisleton.8  Lord  Harrowby  was  a  very 

[x  This  Executive  Commission  must,  of  course,  be  carefully  dis- 
tinguished from  the  Commission  "appointed  to  inquire  into  the 
state,  discipline,  studies,  and  revenues  of  the  University  and  Col- 
leges of  Oxford,"  which  has  formed  the  subject  of  the  previous  part 
of  this  chapter.  —  Ed.] 

P  George  Granville  Francis  Egerton,  second  Earl  of  Ellesmere. 
1823-1862.] 

[3  Dudley  Ryder,  second  Earl  of  Harrowby,  M.A.,  D.C.L.,Oxon. ; 
M.P.  for  Tiverton;  Lord  Privy  Seal;  etc.  Born  1798;  died 
1882.] 

[4  Charles  Thomas  Longley;   1794-1868.] 

[5  Sir  George  Cornewall  Lewis,  second  Baronet,  the  statesman  and 
author;  a  Liberal  M.P.,  held  various  high  political  posts;  editor 
of  the  Edinburgh  Review.  1806-1863.] 

[6  First  Baron  Coleridge,  1820-1894.] 

[7  Probably  Sir  John  Wither  Awdry,  at  one  time  Chief  Justice 
of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Bombay.  1795-1878.] 

[8  The  Honourable  Edward  Turner  Boyd  Twisleton ;  politician ; 
Fellow  of  Balliol ;  barrister.  1809-1874.] 


108  REMINISCENCES 

worthy  man  and  a  statesman,  the  model  of  a  Liberal 
Conservative,  who  by  his  inconveniently  open  mind 
had  given  much  trouble  to  Whips.  Sir  George  Corne- 
wall  Lewis  was  that  scholar  and  statesman  whom 
Palmerston.  would  have  preferred  to  Gladstone  as  his 
political  heir.  He  was  a  profound  scholar.  The  list 
of  his  works  nils  more  than  two  columns  and  a  half  of 
the  " Dictionary  of  National  Biography,"  but  most 
of  them  died  with  him ;  for  their  heaviness  was  not  less 
remarkable  than  their  accurate  erudition.  He  was 
personally  popular  and  took  great  care  to  keep  in  touch 
with  the  House.  Yet  it  was  difficult  to  believe  that  he 
could  be  a  successful  leader,  especially  when  he  would 
have  had  Gladstone  on  his  flank.  He  could  say  a 
good  thing.  It  was  he  who  said  after  a  crush  party, 
"Life  would  be  pleasant  enough  if  it  were  not  for  its 
pleasures."  Destructive  criticism  was  his  forte.  In 
two  ponderous  volumes  he  destroyed  the  fabulous  his- 
tory of  longevity,  and  he  did  expose  the  Countess  of 
Desmond,1  Old  Parr,2  and  other  pretended  centena- 
rians. But  he  was  too  critical  in  contending  that  no- 
body had  ever  been  proved  to  have  lived  to  a  hundred. 
Among  other  instances,  an  herbalist  at  Oxford  had  cer- 
tainly lived  to  one  hundred  and  four.  It  was  said  that 
when  Lewis  was  canvassing  for  Parliament,  if  an  elector 
refused  his  vote,  he  would  say,  "If  you  can't  give  me 

t1  Katherine  Fitzgerald,  Countess  of  Desmond,  second  wife  of 
Thomas,  the  twelfth  Earl ;  said  to  have  lived  to  140.  Died  in  1604.] 

[2  Thomas  Parr,  a  native  of  Alberbury,  near  Shrewsbury.  Said 
to  have  been  born  in  1483 ;  died  in  1635.] 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  109 

your  vote,  perhaps  you  can  direct  me  to  some  case  of 
longevity  in  this  neighbourhood."  No  man  was  more 
respected  or  beloved  by  those  who  knew  him  well. 

Edward  Twisleton  was  a  man  of  leisure,  very  learned, 
among  other  things  a  Hebrew  scholar,  an  unusual 
accomplishment  for  a  layman.  He  was  expected 
to  turn  out  some  great  work.  In  the  end  he  turned 
out  nothing  but  a  dissertation  on  the  ecclesiastical  mir- 
acle of  the  " African  Confessors,"1  who  talked  when 
their  tongues  had  been  cut  out,  and  a  preface  to  an 
inquiry  by  an  expert  in  handwriting  into  the  author- 
ship of  Junius,2  which  concluded,  like  all  the  other 
evidence,  in  favour  of  Francis. 

The  Oxford  Bill  brought  me  into  contact  incidentally 
with  a  very  notable  character,  Bethell,3  then  Attorney- 
General,  afterwards  Lord  Westbury  and  Chancellor, 
about  whom  many  stories  have  been  told.  Meeting 
him  one  morning  in  consultation  about  the  Bill,  seeing 
him  very  lively,  and  knowing  how  great  his  burden  of 
work  was,  I  could  not  help  complimenting  him  on  the 
ease  with  which  he  bore  it.  "Yes,"  he  replied,  in  his 

P  "  The  Tongue  not  Essential  to  Speech ;  with  illustrations  of 
the  Power  of  Speech  in  the  African  Confessors."  By  the  Hon. 
Edward  Twisleton.  London  :  John  Murray.  1873.] 

[2  "The  Handwriting  of  Junius  Professionally  Investigated  by 
Mr.  Charles  Chabot,  Expert."  With  Preface  and  Collateral  Evi- 
dence by  the  Hon.  Edward  Twisleton.  London:  John  Murray, 
Albemarle  Street.  1871.  Quarto.  Pp.  Ixxviii,  300;  and  267 
plates.] 

[3  Richard  Bethell,  first  Baron  Westbury ;  Liberal  M.P. ;  Solici- 
tor-General ;  Attorney-General ;  Lord  Chancellor.  Born  1800 ; 
died  1873.] 


110  REMINISCENCES 

invariably  pious  strain  and  with  his  usual  mincing 
accent,  "I  thank  God  it  is  so,  and  I  owe  it  under  Prov- 
idence to  my  habit  of  always  working  early  in  the  morn- 
ing, not  late  at  night.  I  set  out  in  life,"  he  added  in  a 
pensive  tone,  "with  many  dear  friends  who  worked  late 
at  night.  I  have  buried  them  all."  He  delighted  the 
world,  while  he  made  himself  plenty  of  enemies,  by 
sharp  satiric  sayings,  his  genius  for  which,  as  well  as  his 
manner  of  uttering  them,  was  incomparable.  Coleridge, 
then  Leader  of  the  Bar,  afterwards  Chief  Justice, 
was  an  object  of  his  antipathy.  After  Coleridge's 
cross-examination  of  the  Tichborne  claimant,  somebody 
was  praising  him  before  Bethell.  "Yes,"  said  Bethell, 
"he  has  thoroughly  exposed  the  greatest  impostor  of 
our  age."  "You  mean  the  Claimant?"  "No."  In 
a  debate  in  the  House  of  Lords  "Lord  Westbury,"  it 
was  said,  "poured  on  the  heads  of  his  opponents  a 
stream  of  pellucid  vitriol."  Crystalline  lucidity  was  the 
special  characteristic  of  his  intellect.  But  his  intellect 
was  also  one  of  first-rate  power.  If  he  had  not  thrown 
himself  away,  he  might  have  given  England  a  code. 
I  had  occasion  to  write  to  him  for  his  opinion  as  to  the 
study  of  Roman  Law  in  the  Law  School  which  we  were 
organizing  at  Oxford.  He  replied  at  once  in  a  long 
letter  showing  his  mastery  both  of  the  subject  and  of 
his  pen.  Even  to  hear  him  argue  in  Chancery  was  a 
treat. 

BethelFs  fall  was  due  to  the  luckless  ambition,  which 
towards  the  close  of  his  career  seized  upon  him,  of  play- 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  111 

ing  the  man  of  pleasure  when  he  was  not  a  man  of  the 
world.  The  abuse  of  a  piece  of  his  patronage  by  his 
scampish  son,  to  which  nobody  could  imagine  that  he 
had  been  privy,  would  not  have  been  fatal  to  him. 
What  was  fatal  was  the  social  offence  he  had  given  by 
introducing  a  certain  Countess  to  high  ladies.  I  was 
sitting  under  the  gallery  of  the  House  of  Commons 
when  the  vote  of  censure  passed.  Mr.  Bouverie *  who, 
though  a  Liberal,  was  the  bitterest  of  the  accusers, 
having  evidently  prepared  his  speech,  was  in  the  full 
tide  of  eloquent  invective  and  was  coming  out  with 
a  fine  quotation  from  Milton  about  Satan,  when  his 
memory  failed  him.  He  paused,  could  not  recollect 
the  passage,  fumbled  in  his  pocket  for  the  slip  on  which 
it  was  written,  drew  it  out  at  last,  read  the  passage, 
and  wrecked  his  peroration;  whereat  I  chuckled,  my 
heart  being  on  the  Satanic  side.  Bethell's  sporting 
aspirations  could  not  fail  to  give  birth  to  jokes. 
" That's  the  shortest  Chancery  suit  ever  I  saw,"  said 
a  sailor,  as  Bethell  in  nautical  costume  went  up  the  side 
of  a  yacht.  He  rented  Hackwood,  the  seat  of  Lord 
Bolton  near  Basingstoke  in  our  neighbourhood,  where 
he  practised  his  markmanship,  too  late  acquired,  on 
rabbits.  One  day,  so  ran  the  story,  a  lawyer  came 
down  from  London  to  confer  with  him  about  a  case 
in  which  they  were  counsel  on  opposite  sides  and  which 
was  to  be  settled  out  of  Court.  When  they  had  done 
their  business,  Bethell  invited  the  lawyer  to  go  out 
P  Edward  PleydeU-Bouverie,  M.P.  for  Kilmarnock.  1844-1874.] 


112  REMINISCENCES 

rabbit-shooting  with  him.  A  rabbit  crossing  the  drive, 
Bethell  fired,  and  the  keeper  received  some  of  the  shot. 
At  a  conference  afterwards  held  in  London  to  draw 
up  the  agreement  the  other  lawyer  was  surprised  to 
find  that  Bethell's  recollection  of  the  terms  differed 
widely  from  his  own.  "But,  Sir  Richard,  I  assure 
you  your  memory  fails  you."  "  Impossible,"  said  Sir 
Richard,  "the  facts  are  fixed  in  my  memory  by  a  par- 
ticular circumstance.  You  will  remember  that  was  the 
day  on  which  you  shot  my  keeper."  The  story,  which 
went  the  round  at  the  time,  if  it  had  a  basis  of  truth,  no 
doubt  gained  considerably  by  circulation;  but  a  great 
intelligence  had  given  birth  to  such  stories  and  made 
itself  a  butt  by  yielding  to  vanity  and  attempting,  at 
an  advanced  age,  to  play  the  part  of  fast  and  sporting 
youth. 

In  connection  with  the  Oxford  Commission  I  had 
reason  to  feel  grateful  for  the  invention  of  the  electric 
telegraph.  The  Act  gave  the  Colleges  a  year  for  the 
revision  of  their  own  Statutes  under  the  Seal  of  the 
Commission.  On  the  last  day  of  the  year,  Colleges 
being  behindhand  with  their  engrossing,  a  meeting  of 
the  Commission  was  held  at  Oxford  to  allow  them  the 
last  moment.  Three  Commissioners  were  a  quorum. 
One  place  was  vacant.  Lord  Ellesmere  was  sick.  The 
Bishop  of  Ripon  had  gone  to  Southampton  to  meet  his 
son,  who  was  returning  from  the  Crimea.  But  four 
Commissioners,  Lord  Harrowby,  Sir  John  Coleridge, 
the  Dean  of  Wells,  and  Sir  John  Awdry,  had  promised 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS^  113 

to  attend.  At  two  o'clock,  the  hour  of  the  meeting, 
I  was  there  with  the  documents  and  the  seal.  The 
Dean  and  Sir  John  Awdry  arrived.  We  sat  waiting  for 
Sir  John  Harrowby  and  Sir  John  Coleridge.  Enter  a 
messenger  from  Lord  Harrowby  to  say  that  he  was 
called  away  to  the  bedside  of  his  brother  who  was 
dangerously  ill  in  Yorkshire.  Still,  with  Sir  John 
Coleridge,  we  had  a  quorum.  But  scarcely  had  Lord 
Harrowby's  messenger  departed  when  there  came  one 
from  Sir  John  Coleridge  to  say  that  Sir  John  could  not 
leave  the  bedside  of  his  son,  the  future  Chief  Justice, 
who  lay  dangerously  ill  at  Ottery,  twelve  miles  from 
Exeter.  Here  was  a  dilemma.  A  lapse  would  have 
entailed  a  fresh  Act  of  Parliament,  to  the  disgust  of  the 
Government  and  to  my  disgrace.  I  rushed  to  the  tele- 
graph office,  which  had  not  been  long  opened,  and 
searched  through  the  wire  for  the  Bishop  of  Ripon  at 
Southampton,  but  in  vain.  Then  I  said  to  the  Dean  of 
Wells  and  Sir  John  Awdry,  "  There  is  still  one  train 
which  reaches  Exeter  just  before  twelve.  You  must 
let  me  put  you  in  it.  I  will  wire  the  station-master 
at  Exeter  to  direct  a  hotel  to  send  a  post-chaise  and 
four  to  Ottery  for  Sir  John  Coleridge.  We  may  hold  a 
meeting  at  Exeter  just  in  time  to  seal  the  Statutes." 
I  did  not  know  Exeter;  but  from  a  person  at  Oxford 
who  did  I  learned  the  name  of  the  hotel  which  Sir  John 
Coleridge  was  most  likely  to  use.  Our  train  was  on 
time  at  Exeter.  I  sprang  out  and  ran  to  the  station- 
master.  He  had  received  my  message  and  had  sent  my 


114  REMINISCENCES 

order  to  the  hotel ;  but  that  hotel  was  closed  !  Another 
hotel,  however,  had  taken  the  order  and  sent  the  post- 
chaise.  Just  before  twelve,  Sir  John  Coleridge  rolled 
into  the  inn  yard ;  the  meeting  was  formed ;  and  before 
the  clock  struck  the  statutes  had  been  sealed.  An 
American  Secretary  would  have  put  back  the  clock, 
but  I  had  not  then  been  in  the  United  States. 

At  the  close  of  the  Oxford  University  Commission 
the  Commissioners  were  so  kind  as  to  offer  to  recom- 
mend me  for  a  permanent  place  in  the  public  service. 
I  declined  the  offer,  that  not  being  my  line.  In  re- 
ference to  some  false  reports,  let  me  say,  that  I  never 
sought  or  desired  anything  of  the  kind.  When  I  got 
the  Professorship  of  History  at  Oxford,  which  came 
to  me  unasked,  I  had  all  that  I  desired  in  life. 

The  work  of  reform  has  been  since  carried  further 
by  a  second  Commission.  The  first  Commission  did, 
I  believe,  as  much  as  was  practicable  at  the  time,  the 
state  of  opinion  and  the  opposing  forces  being  what 
they  were.  It  swept  away  the  medieval  statutes, 
opened  the  Fellowships  and  Scholarships  to  merit,  and 
practically  transferred  the  University  from  clerical 
to  academic  hands.  The  tests  were  partly  abrogated 
by  the  same  Bill,  and  entire  abrogation  was  sure  to 
follow.  A  liberal  constitution  was  given  to  the  Univer- 
sity, and  an  existence  independent  of  the  Colleges  was 
restored  to  it;  though  a  federation  of  Colleges  in  the 
main  it  must  continue  to  be,  and  College  life  must  always 
be  the  life  at  Oxford.  The  result,  amplified  as  it  has 


UNIVERSITY  COMMISSIONS  115 

since  been,  proved  the  soundness  of  the  maxim  that  the 
half  loaf  is  better  than  no  bread. 

With  reform  from  without  went  reform  from  within, 
carried  forward  by  the  same  hands.  The  range  of 
studies  was  enlarged,  science  was  recalled  from  exile, 
and,  with  law  and  modern  history,  introduced  into  the 
course.  The  proper  function  of  the  University,  how- 
ever, at  Oxford  and  elsewhere,  still  remains  unsettled. 
The  old  idea  was  that  the  University  in  its  educational 
capacity  was  to  be  a  mental  training-place  and  a  seat 
for  studies  unremunerative  in  themselves ;  as  Freeman 
said  in  his  bluff  way,  it  was  to  be  devoted  to  the  teach- 
ing of  things  which  were  of  no  "Use.  The  new  idea,  which 
is  gaining  ground  and  in  America  has  almost  displaced 
the  old  idea,  is  that  the  University  is  to  be  a  mart  of  all 
kinds  of  scientific  or  superior  knowledge,  out  of  which 
each  student  is  to  choose  the  article  most  useful  for  his 
destined  career.  The  gymnastic  and  the  bread-and- 
butter  system,  in  short,  are  still  confronting  each  other, 
while  there  is  generally  a  rather  awkward  and  uneasy 
attempt  to  combine  the  two.  There  is  no  essential 
antagonism  between  studies;  a  study  may  be  useful 
and  gymnastic  at  the  same  time.  But  this  does  not 
extend  to  trades,  and  into  American  and  Canadian 
Universities  trades  are  rinding,  if  they  have  not  already 
found,  their  way. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

EDUCATION  COMMISSION 
1858-1861 

The  Commissioners  —  William  Charles  Lake  —  Nassau  Senior  — 
James  Fraser  — Popular  Education. 

A  FEW  years  after  the  University  Commission,  I 
was  a  member  of  the  Commission  appointed  to  report 
to  Parliament  on  the  subject  of  national  education  and 
to  frame  a  plan.  The  other  Commissioners  were  the 
Duke  of  Newcastle,1  chairman;  Sir  John  Coleridge,2 
Lake,3  afterwards  Dean  of  Durham;  Senior,4  the  lead- 
ing economist ;  Edward  Miall ; 5  and  William  Rogers.6 
Coleridge,  Lake,  and  perhaps  in  some  degree  the  chair- 
man, though  he  was  very  liberal,  represented  the  inter- 
ests of  the  Church;  Edward  Miall  those  of  the  Non- 
conformists; Senior  those  of  social  reform  on  secular 

p  The  fifth  Duke.] 

[2  Sir  John  Taylor  Coleridge,  a  nephew  of  Samuel  Taylor  Cole- 
ridge, Justice  of  the  Bang's  Bench  from  1835  to  1858.  Born  1791 ; 
died  1876.] 

[3  William  Charles  Lake,  Dean  of  Durham  from  1869  till  1894.] 

[4  Nassau  William  Senior,  the  economist  and  author ;  Professor 
of  Political  Economy  at  Oxford  1825-1830  and  1847-1852.] 

[5  Edward  Miall,  an  Independent  Minister  of  Leicester ;  estab- 
lished The  Nonconformist;  M.P.  for  Bradford.  1809-1881.] 

[*  William  Rogers  was  a  great  educational  reformer ;  curate  of 
St.  Thomas's,  Charterhouse,  London ;  Prebendary  of  St.  Paul's ; 
Rector  of  St.  Botolph's ;  etc.  1819-1896.] 

116 


EDUCATION  COMMISSION  117 

principles;  William  Rogers,  though  he  was  a  clergy- 
man, those  of  popular  education  pure  and  simple.  I 
was  appointed  perhaps  specially  to  deal  with  the  subject 
of  the  existing  Charities,  educational  and  of  other 
kinds,  which  it  was  proposed  to  include  in  the  inquiry. 
I  wrote  the  section  of  the  Report  on  those  subjects, 
which  afterwards  had  the  honour  of  furnishing  the 
raw  materials  for  a  famous  speech  of  Gladstone.  As 
junior  member,  our  eminent  secretary  Fitzjames  Ste- 
phen l  not  giving  the  work  much  of  his  time,  I  had  to 
give  it  a  good  deal  of  mine,  and  for  two  years  was  much 
at  the  office,  not  a  little  to  the  prejudice  of  my  literary 
pursuits. 

Lake  was  a  considerable  man  in  his  day;  now,  I 
suppose,  like  many  considerable  men,  forgotten.  He 
was  one  of  Newman's  circle,  perhaps  of  the  outer  circle, 
who  had  not  joined  the  secession ;  a  friend  and  ardent 
supporter  of  Gladstone,  a  stately  and  imposing  sort  of 
man.  William  Rogers,2  "fat  Rogers"  as  we  used  to 
call  him  at  Eton,  was  Minister  of  a  parish  in  the  East 
of  London  and  a  noble  specimen  of  that  section  of  his 
order  which,  when  reform  knocked  at  the  door  of  the 
slumbering  Church,  took,  not  to  theological  reaction 
or  agitation,  but  to  philanthropic  effort.  He  did  a  great 
work  among  the  neglected  masses  of  the  city  poor. 

Nassau  Senior  was  very  eminent  as  a  political  econo- 


f1  Sir  James  Fitzjames  Stephen,  the  judge,  afterwards  created  a 
Baronet.     1829-1894.] 

[2  Frederick  Rogers  in  the  original  MS.] 


118  REMINISCENCES 

mist,  and  was  in  the  front  of  all  inquiries  and  move- 
ments of  that  kind.  He  was  also  a  great  political  quid- 
nunc, as  is  shown  by  his  Diary  of  interviews  *  with  some 
of  the  leading  statesmen  of  Europe,  who,  however,  it 
may  be  suspected,  were  too  shrewd  to  unbosom  them- 
selves without  reserve.  He  had  a  grudge  against  the 
Poor  Law  Board,  and  when  he  insisted  upon  drafting  a 
report  upon  their  schools,  we  knew  what  he  would  do, 
and  were  prepared  to  deal  with  his  draft  accordingly. 
The  draft,  being  loosely  tied  up,  slipped  out  of  the 
envelope  in  the  post,  and  was  misdelivered  to  the  Poor 
Law  Board,  which  refused  to  part  with  it  on  my  appli- 
cation, and  drew  up  a  very  full-bodied  reply.  Senior 
was  not  orthodox,  and  he  fluttered  the  High  Church 
members  of  the  Commission  by  saying,  when  there  was 
a  question  about  reading  the  Bible  in  schools,  that  "he 
did  not  want  the  children  to  be  taught  the  very  barbar- 
ous history  of  a  very  barbarous  people."  He  was  a 
thorough-going  economist  and  anti-imperialist.  That 
the  Empire  of  India  was  essential  to  the  greatness  of 
England  he  held  to  be  a  great  mistake;  he  wished  we 
were  well  rid  of  it,  if  we  only  knew  how. 

Not  the  least  valuable  part  of  our  Report  was  that 
furnished  by  Assistant  Commissioners  whom  we  sent 
out  to  inquire  into  the  existing  state  of  things  in  Eng- 

f1  "Journals,  Conversations  and  Essays";  "Correspondence  and 
Conversations  of  Alexis  de  Tocqueville  with  N.  W.  Senior  "  ;  "Con- 
versations with  M.  Thiers,  Guizot  .  .  .";  "Conversations  with 
distinguished  Persons  .  .  .";  "Conversations  and  Journals  in 
Egypt  and  Malta  "  ;  etc.] 


EDUCATION  COMMISSION  119 

land  and  into  the  operation  of  foreign  systems.  One 
of  the  Assistant  Commissioners  was  my  friend  and 
neighbour  in  the  country  already  mentioned,  James 
Fraser,  who,  like  Rogers,  was  a  fine  specimen  of  the 
unsacerdotal  and  undogmatic  revival  among  the  clergy 
of  the  Church  of  England.  His  theological  opinions  he 
would  perhaps  neither  have  found  it  very  easy,  nor  have 
much  cared,  to  define.  When  he  became  Bishop  of 
Manchester,  he  was  in  his  right  place ;  and  he  no  doubt 
did,  and  by  his  influence  led  the  chiefs  of  industry  and 
commerce  to  do,  much  social  good.  Our  last  meeting 
was  in  his  house  at  Manchester,  which  I  am  sure  he  did 
not  call  The  Palace.  He  had  just  been  fiercely  de- 
nounced by  Mrs.  Besant  for  saying  that  the  loss  of 
religious  belief  was  followed  by  a  falling  off  in  morality. 
What  he  said  nevertheless  was  true  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
though  the  remedy  needed  was  not  the  revival  of  dead 
beliefs,  but  the  establishment  of  fresh  and  living  princi- 
ples in  their  place. 

Of  the  Duke,  our  Chairman,  I  shall  have  to  speak 
presently.  He  performed  his  office  as  a  Moderator  well. 
The  Commission  opened  with  debate  on  the  general 
question,  different  phases  of  opinion  on  which  we  had 
been  appointed  to  represent.  A  debate  among  able 
men,  as  my  colleagues  were,  round  a  table  without 
reporters,  is  instructive.  The  discussion  left  me  inclined 
on  the  whole  to  the  voluntary  and  parental  system, 
when  it  is  practicable,  as  opposed  to  any  state  machine ; 
and  what  I  have  seen  in  the  United  States  and  Canada 


120  REMINISCENCES 

has  confirmed  me  in  that  opinion,  though  the  State 
system  has  become  so  firmly  established  that  I  have 
hardly  ever  thought  it  worth  while  to  raise  the  question, 
and  have  never  refused  to  act  under  the  established  sys- 
tem. Democracy  needs  security  for  the  voter's  educa- 
tion ;  but  this  might  be  afforded  by  an  educational  test. 
Edward  Miall,  who  was  with  me  on  this  question,  and  I, 
put  our  convictions  and  the  reasons  for  them  on  record ; 
then,  finding  ourselves  outvoted  by  five  to  two,  we 
waived  our  dissent  and  proceeded  with  our  colleagues 
to  conduct  inquiry  and  in  common  frame  the  report. 

In  deciding  this  very  vital  question  much  may  depend 
on  circumstances  social  and  domestic.  Certainly  re- 
ligious and  probably  family  influence  was  strong  in  the 
old  local  schools  of  Scotland  and  New  England.  The 
public  school  cannot  do  much  to  mould  character  or 
manner;  the  influence  of  the  teacher  as  a  rule  seems 
not  to  be  great.  It  is  apt  to  have  against  it  the  fond 
parent,  who,  the  teacher  not  having  been  chosen  by  him, 
is  apt  to  side  with  the  refractory  child.  The  private 
school  seems  to  be  generally  preferred  to  the  public 
school  by  those  who  can  afford  it,  though  they  have  as 
tax-payers  to  pay  for  both.  Of  union  of  classes, 
therefore,  if  this  is  an  object,  there  cannot  be  very 
much. 


CHAPTER  IX 

LAW 

Lincoln's  Inn  —  On  Circuit  —  English  and  American  Courts  of 
Justice  —  Criminal  Law  —  Judges  —  The  Bar — Sir  Gardner 
Engleheart  —  Briton  Riviere 

CHIEFLY  to  please  my  friends,  who  thought  that  a 
youth  who  had  taken  a  First  Class  at  Oxford  was  sure 
to  become  a  Judge,  I  read  Law,  taking  up  my  abode  in 
London  for  the  purpose.  Law  as  a  study  suited  me  well 
enough.  I  even  rather  liked  Fearne  on  "  Contingent 
Remainders " 1  for  the  perfection  of  the  deductive 
reasoning  from  a  perfectly  arbitrary  premise.  Nor 
did  I  fail  to  appreciate  the  ingenuity  of  the  old  pleading 
system,  quaint  and  grotesque  as  its  formularies  were. 
But  for  Law  as  a  profession  I  soon  saw  that  I  should 
not  have  either  strength  or  the  other  requisite  quali- 
ties ;  for  I  have  no  gift  of  speech.  My  little  knowledge 
of  Law,  however,  was  useful  to  me  when  I  became  Pro- 
fessor of  History.  I  duly  ate  my  dinners  at  Lincoln's 
Inn.  A  course  of  dinners  was  the  curriculum  in  those 
days.  For  the  eating  of  dinners  as  a  qualification  for  a 
learned  profession  excellent  reasons  were  given;  as 
excellent  reasons  had  been  given  for  the  exclusion  of  the 

I1  "An  Essay  on  the  Learning  of  contingent  Remainders  and 
executory  Devises.'7  By  Charles  Fearne.  First  published  in  1772. ] 

121 


122  REMINISCENCES 

half-blood  from  inheritance  and  the  denial  of  counsel  to 
felons.  I  was  called  to  the  Bar,  but  never  appeared  in 
Court.  The  only  cause  I  ever  pleaded  was  as  Secretary 
of  the  Oxford  Commission  in  defence  of  some  of  its 
ordinances  before  the  Privy  Council.  The  Court  kindly 
gave  judgment  in  my  favour. 

My  instructor  in  pleading  was  Temple/  a  most  genial 
guide  over  those  sombre  realms.  He  told  me  an  anec- 
dote illustrative  of  the  perfection  of  jury  trial.  His 
father,  a  country  gentleman  popular  in  the  neighbour- 
hood, had  a  cause  coming  on  at  the  Assizes.  The  day 
before  the  trial  a  farmer  called  on  him  and  said,  "Mr. 
Temple,  sir,  you've  a  cause  coming  on  to-morrow. 
Don't  you  be  afeared,  sir;  I'm  on  the  jury.  I've  just 
bought  a  new  pair  of  leather  breeches,  and  I'll  sit  a  hole 
in  'em  afore  I  find  agin  yer." 

Though  I  never  practised  Law,  I  saw  something  of 

[^'Temple"  in  the  MS.  But  Sir  J.  Gardner  D.  Engleheart  is 
kind  enough  to  write  to  me  thus  :  "  His  name  was  Templer,  and 
he  had  chambers  in  the  Middle  Temple  where  Smith  and  I  read  for 
a  few  months  in  1847  or  1848,  and  learnt,  or  thought  we  learnt, 
'  special  pleading '  intricacies.  .  .  .  Templer  was,  I  think,  a 
Devonshire  man,  a  relation  or  a  very  intimate  friend  of  the 
Rajah  of  Borneo."  — Acting  on  this  clue,  Mr.  C.  E.  A.  Bedwell,  Li- 
brarian of  the  Middle  Temple,  is  good  enough  to  do  me  the  service 
of  identifying  him  as  John  Charles  Templer,  younger  son  of  James 
Templer  of  The  Grove,  Bridport.  He  was  born  in  1814 ;  edu- 
cated at  Westminster  School ;  entered  Trinity  College,  Cambridge 
— A.B.  1836  ;  called  to  the  Bar  (Inner  Temple)  1853  ;  and  held  for 
nearly  thirty  years  a  Mastership  in  the  Court  of  the  Exchequer. 
He  was  the  constant  friend  and  correspondent  of  Rajah  Brooke. 
He  died  on  the  llth  of  June,  1874.  —  "It  is  a  tradition  in  the 
family  .  .  .  that  their  name  was  originally  Temple."  (See  The 
Law  Times  for  June  27,  1874  ;  vol.  57,  p.  165.)] 


LAW  123 

that  side  of  life.  I  went  two  circuits  with  my  kind  and 
revered  friend  Judge  Coleridge/  the  brother  of  Edward 
Coleridge,  my  Eton  Tutor,  as  his  Marshal.  The  office 
was  almost  honorary,  but  its  holder  travelled  and  lived 
with  the  Judges.  Pleasant  trips  those  two  circuits 
were.  The  second  Judge  on  one  was  Vaughan  Wil- 
liams,2 on  the  other  Baron  Parke.3  Vaughan  Williams 

I  remember  for  his  good  humour  and  kindness.     Parke 
was  no  ordinary  man.     His  massive  and  powerful  frame 
was  the  abode  of  an  intellect  not  less  massive  and  power- 
ful.   Every  sentence  he  uttered  was  like  a  die  stamped 
by  a  mighty  engine.     Yet  strange  to  say  the  narrowness 
of  this  intellect,  at  least  in  its  professional  aspect,  was 
not  less  notable  than  its  strength.     As  a  lawyer  and  a 
Judge,  Parke  was  remarkable  for  extreme  technicality. 

II  Ingenio   magno,   immensa   doctrina,   acumine   mentis 
subtilissimo,  leges  Anglicae  feliciter  ad  absurdum  reduxit," 
was  the    epitaph,  I   believe,  which  my  impertinence 
composed  for  him,  and  I  trust  never  reached  his  ears. 

On  the  Western  circuit  the  leading  advocate  was 


f1  Sir  John  Taylor  Coleridge.] 

[2  Edward  Vaughan  Williams,  son  of  Sergeant  Williams,  the 
author  of  "Williams's  'Saunders'"  (the  sixth  and  best  edition  of 
Sir  Edmund  Saunders's  "Reports  of  Several  Pleadings  and  Cases 
in  K.B.  in  the  Time  of  Charles  II.,"  known  as  the  'Pleader's 
Bible  ') ;  appointed  a  Judge  of  the  Court  of  Common  Pleas ;  retired 
in  1865 ;  became  a  Privy  Councillor  and  a  member  of  the  judicial 
committee  of  that  body.  He  wrote  much,  notably  a  Treatise  on 
the  Law  of  Executors  and  Administrators.  Born  in  1797;  died 
in  1875.] 

[3  No  doubt  meant  for  Sir  James  Parke,  afterwards  Baron 
Wensleydale.  1782-1868.] 

jZU* 
I/ 


124  REMINISCENCES 

Cockburn,1  afterwards  Chief  Justice.  He  was  a  bril- 
liant orator  in  Parliament  as  well  as  at  the  Bar,  and 
earned  his  Chief  Justiceship  by  a  speech  in  defence  of 
Palmerston.2  Yet  it  seemed  to  me  that  he  was  not  so 
successful  an  advocate  as  Crowder,3  who  was  no  orator, 
indeed  a  tedious  speaker,  but  master  of  the  game,  and 
particularly  pertinacious  and  skilful  in  cross-examina- 
tion. Cockburn  was  rather  too  fond  of  showing  his  gift. 
If  I  mistake  not,  I  once  saw  him  rather  mortified  when 
a  case  went  off  in  favour  of  his  client  and  he  missed  an 
opportunity  of  making  a  great  speech. 

Two  things  impressed  me.  One  was  the  superior 
effect  of  a  quiet  and  seemingly  fair  manner  on  a  jury. 
Bullying  witnesses  is  certainly  a  mistake  as  well  as  an 
offence.  The  natural  sympathy  of  a  juryman  when  a 
witness  is  being  bullied  by  counsel  is  with  the  witness. 
The  juryman  may  some  day  be  a  witness  himself.  The 
other  thing  was  the  command  which  an  English  Judge 
has  of  his  Court,  which,  in  saving  of  time  as  well  as 
in  security  for  justice,  amply  repays  to  the  country  the 
large  salaries  required  to  tempt  the  leaders  from  the 
Bar.  I  have  since  seen  something  of  American  Courts 
of  Justice  and  have  been  struck  with  the  contrast.  A 
Judge  of  the  American  Supreme  Court  told  me  that  in 
attending  an  English  Court  he  had  been  surprised  at  the 

I1  Sir  Alexander  James  Edmund  Cockburn.     Born    1802 ;    died 

1880.] 

[2In  the  House  of  Commons  on  the  28th  of  June,  1850.] 

[»  Sir  Richard  Budden  Crowder,  Q.C.  1837 ;   M.P.  1849-1854 ; 

puisne  judge  1854.     Born  1795 ;  died  1859.] 


LAW  125 

expedition  with  which  cases  were  settled,  while,  so  far 
as  he  could  see,  justice  was  done.  The  explanation  is 
the  command  which  the  English  Judge  has  over  his 
Court ;  and,  it  must  be  added,  the  freedom  with  which 
he  is  allowed  to  charge  the  rural  jury,  whose  power  of 
reviewing  and  balancing  the  evidence  would  often,  in  a 
case  at  all  complicated,  totally  fail. 

The  appeal  in  criminal  cases  in  America  postponed 
execution  in  one  case  for  nearly  two  years.  It  often 
postpones  execution  till  the  crime  is  forgotten  and 
public  sympathy  passes  from  the  victim  to  the 
murderer.  In  England,  though  there  has  been  no 
appeal,1  other  than  occasional  revision  of  the  sentence 
by  the  Home  Secretary,  I  do  not  remember  to  have 
heard  of  a  single  case  in  which  it  was  proved  that  the 
wrong  man  had  been  hanged.  Once,  however,  this  was 
near  happening.  A  man  was  under  sentence  for  mur- 
der in  Lancashire.  The  Home  Secretary,  having  taken 
the  opinion  of  the  presiding  Judge  as  to  the  sufficiency 
of  the  evidence,  had  gone  down  to  the  King  at  Windsor, 
leaving  directions  with  his  Under  Secretary  that  justice 
was  to  take  its  course.  In  his  absence  came  the  Gov- 
ernor of  Lancashire  gaol,  praying  for  a  stay  of  execution. 
He  had  no  new  facts  to  present ;  his  only  plea,  the  weak- 
ness of  which  he  admitted,  was  that  he  was  familiar 
with  the  manner  of  the  condemned  and  that  there  was 
something  in  this  man's  manner  which  convinced  him 

P  It  must  be  remembered  that  this  was  written  before  the  Crimi- 
nal Appeal  Act  of  1907 :  7  Edw.  VII,  Chapter  23.] 


126  REMINISCENCES 

that  the  man  was  innocent.  The  Under  Secretary 
repeated  his  chief's  instructions.  But  the  Governor 
persisted  with  such  earnestness  that  at  last  the  Under 
Secretary  gave  way  and  took  it  upon  him  to  stay  exe- 
cution. Another  man  afterwards  confessed  the  mur- 
der. I  had  this  from  Lord  Cardwell. 

We  had  a  painful  scene  at  the  trial  of  a  woman  for 
murder ;  if  I  recollect  rightly,  it  was  for  the  murder  of 
her  own  child,  and  for  the  sake  of  the  money  which  she 
got  from  a  society  for  the  burial.  The  trial  lasted  all 
day,  and  the  prisoner,  though  her  life  was  at  stake, 
fell  into  a  state  of  weary  apathy,  as  I  observed  prisoners 
even  on  trial  for  their  lives  were  apt  to  do.  The  jury 
went  out  to  consider  their  verdict.  They  returned 
with  a  verdict  of  guilty,  but  with  a  recommendation  to 
mercy.  When  they  were  asked  the  reason  of  their  rec- 
ommendation, the  Foreman  said  that  one  of  them  was 
not  satisfied  with  the  evidence.  They  were  thereupon 
sent  back  to  reconsider  their  verdict.  While  they  were 
gone,  the  prisoner's  feelings  awoke,  and  we  had  a  heart- 
rending half-hour.  At  length  the  jury  came  in  with 
an  unanimous  verdict  of  guilty.  The  Judge  told 
me  that  he  had  no  doubt  that  the  woman  had  been 
rightly  convicted  and  that  there  was  reason  for  believ- 
ing that  it  was  not  her  first  murder. 

Evidence  of  a  murder  can  seldom  be  direct,  and  in 
the  only  murder-case  witnessed  by  me  in  which  the 
evidence  was  direct  the  result  was  an  acquittal.  It 
was  a  case  of  parricide.  The  prisoner  and  his  father 


LAW  127 

were  proved  to  have  been  on  bad  terms.  One  night  in 
a  tavern  close  to  a  bridge  they  quarrelled  before  wit- 
nesses. The  old  man  went  out;  his  son  immediately 
followed.  A  man  and  his  wife  saw  the  son  throw  the 
father  from  the  bridge  into  the  river,  where  his  body 
was  found.  They  were  timorous  people,  and  ran  away. 
In  cross-examination  this  evidence  was  a  little  but  not 
materially  shaken.  The  Judge  fully  expected  a  convic- 
tion. Then  came  the  family  of  the  murdered  man  and 
the  murderer,  and  swore  a  circumstantial  alibi;  their 
story  being  all  true  except  the  time,  about  which  it  was 
easy  for  them  to  agree  on  a  concerted  falsehood.  The 
jury  found  not  guilty,  and  the  murderer  threw  up  his 
cap  and  ran  gleefully  out  of  Court  like  a  boy  running 
out  of  school.  The  Judge  had  charged  distinctly 
against  an  acquittal,  and  was  certainly  right.  Prob- 
ably some  local  or  personal  feeling  prevailed.  Such, 
when  the  verdict  was  against  the  Judge's  charge,  might 
generally  be  taken  to  be  the  case. 

In  a  bill-stealing  case  at  Bristol  pitiably  figured 
last  male  descendant  of  my  idol,  Sir  Walter  Scott.     He 
had  been  the  victim  of  a  gang  of  bill-stealers,  but  his 
own  habits  and  associations  had  evidently  been  such  as 
to  disgrace  his  illustrious  origin.     There  was  a  certaii 
likeness  to  Sir  Walter  in  his  face,  but  he  had  nothing  of 

Sir  Walter's  forehead.    He  died,  I  believe,  soon  after-  -     — • 

-  L^J*  a^*-*- 

wards.  .     .  , 

I  was  deeply  impressed  with  the  responsibility  of  a 
Judge  presiding  in  a  trial    for  murder  and  having  to 




i  ~s  •      'ir~~~n'r  x 


™  j~^  *  WUf  «£fc  txy.  4^  «L^ 

• 


128  REMINISCENCES 

pronounce  sentence  of  death.  I  felt  thankful  that  the 
responsibility  would  never  be  mine.  Capital  punish- 
ment, experience  seems  to  show,  is  the  only  sufficient 
safeguard  for  innocent  life.  Nor,  when  a  man  has  been 
convicted  of  deliberate  and  mercenary  or  selfish  mur- 
der, can  life  for  him  have  any  value.  His  existence 
thenceforth  can  be  only  that  of  a  being  abhorred  of  his 
fellows,  and,  if  any  moral  sensibility  linger  in  him,  of 
himself.  Othello's  murder  is  not  mercenary  or  selfish ; 
it  springs  from  a  passion  in  itself  generous.  We  should 
not  like  to  hang  him.  But  he  feels  himself  that  he  can- 
not live.  Solitary  confinement  for  life  is  worse  than 
death,  and  it  shuts  out  the  possibility  of  moral  re- 
generation, which  only  social  action  can  produce.  Yet 
it  must  be  painful  to  pronounce  the  irrevocable  doom. 
I  could  see  that  the  Judges  felt  this,  though  their  con- 
sciences were  free,  and  their  sensibilities,  like  those  of 
the  surgeon  who  performed  painful  operations,  had  been 
brought  under  control  by  habit. 

The  conversation  of  the  Judges  when  they  came  home 
to  dinner  was  very  pleasant.  Without  being  shoppy, 
it  abounded  in  legal  anecdote.  The  subject  of  the 
liveliest  stories  was  M.  Justice  Maule,1  a  name  now  per- 
haps hardly  remembered  outside  the  profession,  unless 
it  be  by  the  humorous  sentence  on  a  penniless  man 
convicted  of  bigamy  which  was  believed  to  have  helped 
in  bringing  about  a  reform  of  the  divorce  law.  Maule 

P  Sir  William  Henry  Maule,  Baron  of  the  Exchequer  1839 ; 
transferred  to  Common  Pleas  1839.  Born  1788 ;  died  1858.] 


\ 


LAW  129 

seemed  to  have  been  a  man  of  rather  loose  habits  and 
opinions,  who  looked  down  from  the  height  of  an  im- 
perial intellect  upon  the  crowd,  genial  at  heart,  but  out- 
wardly cynical  and  freely  indulging  his  satiric  vein. 
He  hated  Coventry,  which,  though  full  of  interesting 
antiquities,  must  be  allowed  to  have  a  somewhat 
mouldy  look.  A  witness  there  was  slow  in  answering. 
"  Witness,"  said  Maule  from  the  Bench,  "you  take  five 
minutes  for  each  answer;  and  you  seem  to  forget  that 
all  that  time  I  am  at  Coventry."  There  were  probably 
editorial  comments  next  morning.  A  case  involving 
indelicate  details  was  being  tried.  Maule  recom- 
mended ladies  to  leave  the  Court.  Some  ladies,  prob- 
ably not  understanding  the  recommendation,  remained. 
As  the  plot  thickened  the  examining  counsel  paused, 
looked  at  the  ladies,  and  then  at  the  Judge,  thinking 
that  the  warning  should  be  repeated.  "Oh,"  said 
Maule,  "go  on,  Mr.  Blank;  the  ladies  like  it,  and  you 
needn't  mind  me." 

Maule,  like  many  men  of  genius,  was  free  in  his 
habits,  and  many  anecdotes  were  the  consequence. 
One  was  that  once  when  rushing  out  of  his  bedroom 
calling  "Fire!"  the  porter  conjured  him  to  go  to  bed 
again. 

The  Bar  was  evidently  becoming  overcrowded.  In 
former  days  there  had  been  a  social  as  well  as  a  profes- 
sional line  between  the  grade  of  Barrister  and  that  of 
Solicitor,  and  the  Solicitor  having  no  son  or  nephew  of 
his  own  at  the  Bar,  was  at  liberty  to  give  a  brief  to  any 


130  REMINISCENCES 

young  man  of  promise.  But  by  this  time  the  social  line 
had  been  effaced,  the  Solicitor  had  connections  at  the 
Bar  to  whom  he  could  without  injustice  to  the  client 
give  the  junior  work ;  and  thus  for  a  young  man  with- 
out connections  the  door  was  closed.  Weary  years  of 
solitary  waiting,  perhaps  unrewarded  after  all,  were  his. 
Under  the  American  and  Canadian  system,  which  fuses 
the  grades  and  permits  the  formation  of  legal  firms,  the 
young  man,  if  he  gets  little  pay,  escapes  the  solitude  and 
the  dreary  inaction  of  English  brieflessness. 

A  friend  of  mine  on  taking  office  asked  me  to  find  him 
a  secretary,  saying  that  I  must  know  a  number  of  clever 
young  Oxford  men.  I  replied  that  I  did,  but  that  I 
was  not  sure  they  would  suit  his  work,  and  he  had  better 
let  me  try  to  find  a  briefless  barrister.  He  scouted 
the  idea  that  any  barrister  would  take  a  place  with  so 
moderate  a  salary  and  no  expectations.  I  went  to  the 
chambers  of  a  friend  whom  I  knew  to  have  every  quali- 
fication for  success  at  the  Bar,  but  believed  not  to  have 
succeeded.  I  found  him  sitting  without  employment 
in  his  solitary  chambers.  I  told  him  faithfully  what  I 
had  to  offer.  He  then  desired  my  advice.  I  asked 
whether  he  had  done  all  in  his  power  to  put  himself  in 
the  way  of  business.  He  told  me  that  he  had,  and  that 
business  had  once  under  special  circumstances  come  to 
tantalize  him,  but  had  departed  and  had  returned  no 
more.  I  then  advised  him  to  accept,  saying  that  even 
if  business  did  come  again,  life  would  be  spent.  He 
took  my  advice ;  commended  himself,  as  I  was  sure  he 


LAW  131 

would,  by  his  practical  ability,  and  became  Sir  Gardner 
Engleheart,1  a  highly  prosperous  and  distinguished  man. 
This  incident  was  one  of  the  flowers  that  grow  beside 
the  rugged  pathway  of  life. 

Once  more  at  least  I  had  a  bit  of  good  luck  in  this 
line.  Briton  Riviere,2  the  great  animal  painter,  was 
the  son  of  a  drawing-master  at  Oxford,  who,  having  been 
unfortunate  as  a  painter,  was  ending  his  life  in  gloom. 
His  son  was  nevertheless  bent  on  being  a  painter,  and 
made  a  great  effort  to  give  himself  a  high  education 
with  that  object.  I  knew  nothing  of  painting,  but  I 
trusted  the  youth's  aspiration  and  gave  him  his  first 
subject.  The  subject,  Clara  bringing  water  to  the 
wounded  Marmion,  which  I  chose,  as  the  picture  was  a 
gift  to  a  Fair  for  the  wounded,  did  not  suit  the  painter's 
genius,  and  the  great  authorities  on  art  at  Oxford  pre- 
dicted that  he  would  fail.  Not  long  afterwards,  led  by 
his  real  genius  into  the  right  line,  Briton  Riviere  was 
receiving  large  sums  for  his  pictures,  and  his  father's 
life  closed  not  in  gloom. 

I1  Sir  John  Gardner  Dilman  Engleheart,  K.C.B.,  Comptroller 
of  the  Household  of  the  Prince  and  Princess  Christian  from  1866 
to  1869;  Clerk  of  the  Council  of  the  Duchy  of  Lancaster  1872- 
1899 ;  Member  of  the  Duchy  Council  1901.] 

[2  Mr.  Briton  Riviere  obtained  his  A.R.A.  in  1879,  and  his  R.A.  in 
1881.  He  is  also  an  Honorary  D.C.L.  of  Oxford.] 


CHAPTER  X 

LONDON 
1845-1861 

Macaulay  —  Samuel  Rogers  —  Lord  Houghton  —  Henry  Hallam  — 
Milman  —  Thackeray  —  Croker  —  Tyndall  —  Herbert  Spencer 

—  "  The  Grange  "  —  Lady  Ashburton  —  Carlyle  —  Tennyson 

—  Bishop    Wilberforce  —  Lady    Waldegrave  —  Parliamentary 
Debates — The   Theatre  —  Louis    Blanc  —  Brougham  —  Lady 
Dukinfield. 

LAW  and  the  three  Commissions  severed  me  from  my 
College  work  and  took  me  a  good  deal  to  London. 
Connections  of  different  kinds  opened  to  me  a  good  deal 
of  social  life  there. 

It  was  an  epoch  in  my  social  life  when  at  the  din- 
ner-table of  Sir  R.  H.  Inglis,1  a  member  for  the  Univer- 
sity of  Oxford,  high  Tory,  and  Protestant,  but  genial 
friend  and  host  of  men  of  all  parties,  I  first  met  Macau- 
lay.  Macaulay  did  talk  essays  and  engross  the  talking 
—  conversation  it  could  not  be  called.  One  could 
understand  how  he  was  a  bore  to  other  talkers.  He 
evidently  was  to  a  great  talker  who  sat  next  to  me. 
He  would  seize  upon  a  theme  and  dilate,  with  copious 
illustration,  from  a  marvellous  memory.  Mention  of 
the  exclusive  respect  of  the  Ritualists  for  churches  in 
the  Gothic  style  led  to  an  enumeration  of  the  Fathers 

P  Sir  Robert  Harry  Inglis,  M.A.,  D.C.L.,  F.S.A.,  F.R.S.,  second 
Baronet.  He  opposed  parliamentary  reform,  Jewish  relief,  repeal 
of  the  corn  laws,  etc.  1786-1855.] 

132 


GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY  YEARS  OF  AGE. 

Copy  of  a  photograph  by  Mayall,  of  Brighton. 
(The  original  hangs  in  the  Common  Room  of  University  College,  Oxford.) 


LONDON  133 

of  the  early  Church  who  had  ministered  in  churches 
which  were  not  Gothic.  A  question  about  the  rules  of 
equestrian  statuary  led  to  a  copious  dissertation  proving 
that  nature  was  the  only  rule.  I  have  seen  a  whole 
evening  party  kept  listening  in  a  ring  to  an  essay  on 
final  causes  and  the  limits  of  their  recognition,  with 
numerous  illustrations.  But  it  seemed  to  me  all  ex- 
uberance, not  assumption  or  ostentation.  Once,  how- 
ever, even  I  thought  Macaulay  a  bore.  It  was  at  a 
breakfast  at  Lord  Stanhope's.1  Lord  Russell  was  begin- 
ning to  give  us  an  account  of  the  trial  of  Queen  Caro- 
line,2 which  he  had  witnessed.  Macaulay  broke  in  with 
an  essay,  and  Lord  Russell  was  swept  away  by  its  tide. 
Of  all  English  talkers  that  I  ever  heard,  Macaulay 
seemed  to  me  the  first  in  brilliancy.  He  is  the  first  in 
brilliancy  of  English  writers,  though  not  always  the  > 
most  sober  or  just.  Of  all  his  writings  the  least  just,  / 
while  it  is  perhaps  the  most  brilliant,  is  the  Essay  on 
Warren  Hastings.  Justice  has  been  done  upon  it  by 
Fitz james  Stephen.3 

Rogers 4  especially  might  well  dislike  Macaulay, 
against  whom,  with  his  feeble  voice,  he  could  make  no 
head.  He  was  silent  during  dinner.  After  dinner, 

P  Philip  Henry,  fifth  Earl  Stanhope,  the  historian.     1805-1875.] 

[2  Queen  of  George  IV.] 

[3  "The  Story  of  Nuncomar  and  the  Impeachment  of  Sir  Elijah 
Impey."  By  Sir  James  Fitzjames  Stephen,  K.C.S.I.,  one  of  the 
Judges  of  the  High  Court  of  Justice,  Queen's  Bench  Division.  In 
two  volumes.  London :  Macmillan  and  Co.  1885.] 

f4  Samuel  Rogers,  the  poet;  published  "Pleasures  of  Memory," 
1792;  "Columbus,"  1810;  !'  Human  Life,"  1819;  etc.  Born  1763; 
died  in  1855.] 


134  REMINISCENCES 

when  the  ladies  were  gone,  he  told  anecdotes  in  lan- 
guage evidently  prepared.  It  was  treason  then  to  talk. 
There  was  certainly  a  strain  of  malice  in  him.  He  was 
sensitive  on  the  subject  of  his  social  position,  and  could 
not  forgive  Sydney  Smith  for  saying  in  his  presence  that 
he  would  "bet  a  cheque  on  Rogers  and  Co."  Theo- 
dore Hook  l  was  never  tired  of  whipping  him  on  that 
tender  spot.  He  was  sensitive  also  about  his  appear- 
ance, as,  if  he  aspired  to  beauty,  he  had  good  reason  for 
being.  It  was  said  that  he  had  driven  his  foot  through 
a  portrait  which  told  unflattering  truth.  I  wish  I  had 
been  present  when  the  attention  of  the  party  was  sud- 
denly drawn  to  a  caricature  bust  of  him  which  the  host 
had  inadvertently  left  upon  the  mantel-piece.  The 
struggles  of  the  party  to  cope  with  the  horror,  some 
taking  the  line  that  it  was  a  likeness,  others  that  it  was 
not,  were  described  to  me  as  very  amusing.  The  im- 
mortality which  Rogers  expected  for  his  poems  has  not 
been  theirs.  He  is  not  deep,  yet  there  are  passages  in 
him,  such  as  the  opening  lines  of  "  Human  Life,"  which 
are  pleasant  to  my  simple  ear. 

Of  all  the  social  talkers  I  should  say  the  pleasantest 
was  Sir  David  Dundas,2  then  Solicitor-General.  He 
really  conversed,  and,  while  leading  the  conversation, 
drew  out  his  company  and  made  other  people  feel  that 
they  too  had  said  good  things. 

P  Theodore  Edward  Hook,  the  novelist  and  wit.     1788-1841.] 
[2  Sir  David  Dundas,  the  statesman ;  M.A.  1822  ;  barrister  1823  ; 
M.P.   1840-1852    and    1861-1867;    Q.C.    1840;   Judge-Advocate- 
General  1849.] 


LONDON  135 

When  the  Life  of  Monckton  Milnes  (Lord  Houghton) l 
appeared,  people  were  disappointed  because  it  did  not 
sparkle  with  wit.  Nobody  who  knew  him  could  share 
the  disappointment.  It  was  not  in  any  witty  things 
that  he  said,  but  in  his  manner,  which  was  wit  in  itself, 
that  the  charm  resided.  His  good-natured  simplicity 
of  speech  (if  that  will  do  for  a  translation  of  naivete)  had 
earned  him  the  nickname  of  "the  cool  of  the  evening." 
He  was  an  eager  hunter  of  notorieties.  It  was  said 
that  he  would  have  had  the  most  noted  felon  of  the  day 
at  his  breakfast-table  if  he  could.  Sitting  there  and 
looking  round  on  the  circle,  you  asked  yourself  how 
you  came  into  that  museum.  Milnes  was  a  great  and 
a  most  successful  collector  of  autographs.  He  showed 
me  on  the  same  page  some  love-verses  written  by 
Robespierre  when  a  youth,  and  a  death-warrant  signed 
by  him  under  the  Reign  of  Terror.  General  Grant,  when 
he  went  to  breakfast  with  Milnes,  was  presented  with 
a  round-robin  which  he  had  signed  as  a  cadet  at  West 
Point.  Milnes  would  not  tell  us  how  he  had  obtained 
it.  To  a  collector  of  autographs  everything  is  moral. 
The  writer  of  "Palm  Leaves,"  2  in  which,  by  the  way, 
there  are  some  very  pretty  lines,  had  at  one  time  been  a 

[l  Richard  Monckton  Milnes,  first  Baron  Houghton,  a  Cam- 
bridge "Apostle  "  ;  M.P.  for  Pontefract,  1837 ;  interested  himself  in 
copyright,  the  Philobiblon  Society,  Miss  Nightingale's  Fund,  Me- 
chanics' Institutes,  Penny  Banks,  Reform  of  the  Franchise ;  a  poet 
and  a  writer  upon  political  and  social  topics.] 

[2  "Palm  Leaves."  See  "The  Poetical  Works  of  (Richard 
Monckton  Milnes)  Lord  Houghton.  Collected  edition.  Two 
vols.  London :  Murray.  1876.  Pp.  134-168.] 


136  REMINISCENCES 

follower  of  Urquhart,1  the  devotee  and  political  champion 
of  Turkey  and  the  East.  Urquhart  can  hardly  have  been 
sane.  Milnes  said  that  once  when  he  went  to  Urquhart 's 
house,  the  door  was  opened  by  Urquhart's  son  stark 
naked ;  that  being  the  father's  idea  of  physical  education. 

Eton  friendship  with  Hallam's  son  Henry  opened  to 
me  the  house  of  his  illustrious  father,2  which  was  no 
longer  in  the  "long  unlovely  street,"  but  in  Wilton 
Crescent.  The  historian  was  then  old  and  bowed  down 
by  the  loss  of  the  son  whose  epitaph  is  "In  Memoriam," 
as  well  as  by  that  of  his  wife  and  his  favourite  daughter. 
In  earlier  days  he  had  been  rather  a  social  terror. 
People  in  his  presence  had  spoken  in  fear  of  contradic- 
tion. It  was  said  that  he  had  got  out  of  bed  in  the  night 
to  contradict  the  watchman  about  the  hour  and  the 
weather.  Sydney  Smith  said  that  the  chief  use  of  the 
electric  telegraph  would  be  to  enable  Hallam  to  con- 
tradict a  man  at  Birmingham.  But  in  his  old  age  and 
to  a  boy  like  me  Hallam  was  all  mildness  and  kindness. 
I  see  the  old  man  now,  sitting  in  his  library,  with  gout  in 
his  hands,  in  mournful  dignity  waiting  for  the  end.  But 
he  would  know  that  his  work  was  done. 

Milman's 3  name  it  now  seldom  heard,  yet  he  has  left 

[l  David  Urquhart,  diplomatist ;  secretary  of  the  British  Embassy 
at  Constantinople ;  M.P.  1847  to  1852.  Born  1805 ;  died  1877.] 

[2  Henry  Hallam,  the  author  of  "State  of  Europe  during  the 
Middle  Ages  "  ;  "Constitutional  History  of  England  "  ;  "Literature 
of  Europe  "  ;  etc.  Born  1777;  died  1859.] 

[3  Henry  Hart  Milman,  Dean  of  St.  Paul's ;  Professor  of  Poetry 
at  Oxford,  1821-1831  ;  best  known  perhaps  by  his  "History  of 
the  Jews,"  his  "History  of  Christianity,"  and  his  "Latin  Chris- 
tianity." Born  1791 ;  died  1868.] 


LONDON  137 

his  mark  in  his  Histories  of  the  Jews  and  of  the  Latin 
Church ;  nor  is  the  "  Martyr  of  Antioch  "  without  merits 
as  a  poem.  The  author  of  the  prize  poem  on  the  Apollo 
Belvedere  *  had  set  out  in  life  with  an  immense  Oxford 
reputation.  In  his  History  of  the  Jews  he  had  as  a  stu- 
dent of  German  theology  faintly  anticipated  the  Higher 
Criticism,  and  incurred  orthodox  suspicion  accordingly. 
That  he  had  talent,  a  richly  stored  mind,  and  conversa- 
tional power  is  certain.  Whether  he  had  anything  more 
is  doubtful.  If  he  had,  it  was  stifled  in  him,  as  it  was 
in  other  rationalist  theologians,  by  the  fatal  white  tie. 
Thackeray  I  used  to  meet  at  the  dinners  of  the  Satur- 
day Review,  but  had  not  much  intercourse  with  him.  If 
he  was  cynical,  his  cynicism  did  not  appear  in  his  face  or 
manner,  which  betokened  perfect  simplicity  and  good 
nature.  From  good  nature,  and  not  from  that  alone,  I 
cannot  help  thinking  that  he  lapsed  when  he  gibbeted 
Croker  2  in  "  Vanity  Fair  "  under  the  name  of  "  Wen- 
ham  "  as  the  parasite  and  pander  of  the  Marquis  of 
Hertford,  easily  discernible  under  the  pseudonym  of 
the  "  Marquis  of  Steyne."  Croker  was  a  rancorous 
politician,  and  both  by  his  tongue  and  pen  provoked 
bitter  enmity;  but  there  was  nothing  in  his  relation 
with  Lord  Hertford 3  to  brand  him  as  a  parasite,  much 

f1  Milman  won  the  Newdigate  Prize  for  English  Verse  in  1812.] 
P  John  Wilson  Croker ;   politician  and  essayist.     Perhaps  many 
remember  him  chiefly  as  the  Editor  of  an  edition  of  Boswell's 
."Johnson."     1780  to  1857.] 

[3  Francis  Charles  Seymour-Conway,  third  Marquess  of  Hert- 
ford ;  M.P.,  Oxford,  Lisburne,  and  Camelford,  1819-1822 ;  Vice- 
Chamberlain  to  George,  Prince  Regent.  1777-1842.] 


138  REMINISCENCES 

less  could  he  be  supposed  capable  of  playing  the  pander. 
As  a  leading  anti-reform  member  of  the  House  of  Com- 
mons he  had  been  an  associate  of  Hertford  and  other 
magnates  of  the  Tory  party.  The  connection  con- 
tinued after  Croker's  retirement  in  disgust  from  public 
life.  Slander,  under  cover  of  a  fictitious  name,  as  I 
have  said  before,  when  the  person  really  meant  can  be 
easily  recognized,  is  at  once  the  most  deadly  and  the 
most  cowardly  of  all  ways  of  assailing  character.  The 
person  assailed  cannot  defend  himself  without  seeming 
to  countenance  the  libel. 

In  the  house  of  Sir  Roderick  Murchison  I  used  to 
meet  the  men  of  science ;  but  it  was  not  till  later  that  I 
became  intimate  with  Huxley  *  and  Tyndall.2  With 
Tyndall  I  became  very  intimate,  and  greatly  loved  him, 
though  on  some  points  we  widely  differed.  He  called 
himself  a  Materialist,  and  never  allowed  you  to  call  him 
anything  else,  ever  faithful  to  his  formula  that  matter 
contained  the  potentiality  of  all  life.  But  never  was  a 
man  less  materialist  in  the  gross  sense  of  the  term.  I 
used  to  think  that  he  would  have  found  it  very  difficult 
to  account,  on  any  materialistic  theory,  for  his  own  sen- 
timents and  aspirations.  Between  Huxley  and  Owen  3 
there  was  at  that  time  war  about  the  Hippocampus 

t1  Thomas  Henry  Huxley,  the  great  comparative  anatomist  and 
supporter  of  the  Darwinian  hypothesis.  Born  1825  ;  died  1895.] 

[2  John  Tyndall,  the  natural  philosopher ;  successor  of  Faraday 
as  Superintendent  of  the  Royal  Institution.  Born  1820 ;  died 
1893.] 

[3  Sir  Richard  Owen,  the  celebrated  anatomist.     1804-1892.] 


LONDON  139 

Minor.  That  Huxley  was  in  the  right  seemed  to  be  the 
verdict  of  the  scientific  world ;  had  he  found  himself  in 
the  wrong,  he  would  have  frankly  owned  it,  for  no  man 
could  be  more  loyal  to  truth.  Murchison  was  a  man  of 
large  property ;  he  had  been  in  the  army ;  had  taken  to 
geology  and  become  the  Amphitryon  of  the  scientific 
world.  He  had  been  engaged  in  exploring  the  mineral 
wealth  of  the  Ural,  and  became  very  intimate  with  the 
Czar,1  whose  feeling  toward  England,  as  he  assured  me, 
I  have  no  doubt  truly,  was  as  good  as  possible,  she  being 
in  the  Czar's  eyes  the  great  conservative  power.  The 
day  before  the  Crimean  War  nobody  expected  or  desired 
it;  while  it  was  going  everybody  was  mad  about  it; 
when  it  was  over  everybody  condemned  and  deplored  it. 
If  I  remember  rightly,  I  was  an  early  subscriber  to 
Herbert  Spencer's  2  works.  But  it  was  not  till  much 
later,  I  think  in  1876,  that  I  became  well  acquainted 
with  the  man.  We  were  staying  at  Buxton  together. 
If  a  new  moral  world  is  built  upon  materialism,  Herbert  / 
Spencer  will  have  been  one  of  the  chief  builders.  In 
any  case,  he  was  a  shining  light  and  a  power.  Of  his 
personal  eccentricities  plenty  of  stories  have  been  told. 
His  nervous  sensibility  was  extreme.  A  game  of  bil- 
liards was  enough  to  deprive  him  of  his  night's  rest.  He 
had  been  looking  forward  with  pleasure  to  a  meeting 
with  Huxley;  but  he  gave  it  up  because  there  was  a 

t1  Nicholas  I.] 

[2  Herbert  Spencer,  author  of  the  Synthetic  Philosophy.     Born 
1820 ;  died  1903.] 


140  REMINISCENCES 

difference  on  some  scientific  question  between  them,  and 
this  might  have  given  rise  to  an  argument  which 
Spencer's  nerves  could  not  bear.  A  literary  flippancy  * 
of  mine  once  caused  an  estrangement  between  us,  but  I 
am  happy  to  say  we  became  the  best  of  friends  again. 
The  most  interesting  of  my  social  experiences,  how- 
ever, were  my  visits  to  The  Grange,  a  name  familiar  to 
all  who  have  read  the  Life  of  Carlyle.  Lord  Ashbur- 
ton,2  of  the  then  immensely  wealthy  House  of  Baring, 
was  a  man  of  intellect  and  culture,  and  by  no  means  a 
social  cipher,  though  a  less  important  figure  than  his 
wife.  Lady  Ashburton  3  was  a  great  lady,  perhaps 
the  nearest  counterpart  that  England  could  produce  to 
the  queen  of  a  French  salon  before  the  Revolution.  In 
person,  though  not  beautiful,  she  was  majestic.  Her 
wit  was  of  the  very  brightest,  and  dearly  she  loved  to 
give  it  play.  She  had  at  the  same  time  depth  of  charac- 

f1  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  said  of  Spencer's  famous  definition  of  Evo- 
lution —  "While  an  aggregate  evolves,  not  only  the  matter  composing 
it,  but  also  the  motion  of  that  matter,  passes  from  an  indefinite 
incoherent  homogeneity  to  a  definite  coherent  heterogeneity" 
("Data  of  Ethics,"  chap,  v.,  §24)  —  that  "the  universe  may  well 
have  heaved  a  sigh  of  relief  when,  through  the  cerebration  of  an 
eminent  thinker,  it  had  been  delivered  of  this  account  of  itself."  — 
See  Contemporary  Review,  vol.  xli,  pp.  335,  et  seq.,  Feb.,  1882  :  "  Has 
Science  yet  Found  a  New  Basis  for  Morality  ?  "  Herbert  Spencer 
replied  in  the  next  number  of  the  Review  with  an  article  on  "Pro- 
fessor Goldwin  Smith  as  a  Critic,"  in  which  the  critic  was  accused 
of  "  grave  misrepresentation."] 

[2  William  Bingham  Baring,  second  Baron  Ashburton.  1799- 
1864.] 

[3  This  was  Lord  Ashburton's  first  wife.  She  had  been  Lady 
Harriet  Mary  Montagu,  eldest  daughter  of  the  sixth  Earl  of  Sand- 
wich.] 


LONDON  141 

ter  and  tenderness  of  feeling.  It  was  a  mistake  to  think 
that  she  was  a  Mrs.  Leo  Hunter  on  a  grand  scale.  She 
cared  as  little  for  reputation  in  itself  as  she  did  for  rank 
or  wealth.  To  form  a  circle  of  brilliant  talkers  with  her- 
self as  its  centre  was  her  aim ;  and  in  this  she  fully  suc- 
ceeded. One  or  two  appreciative  listeners  were  also 
desirable,  and  were  there.  Beauty  may  have  been  a 
passport,  at  least  I  do  not  know  what  but  the  wonder- 
ful beauty  of  Mrs.  Bigelow  Lawrence,  Sally  Ward 1 
that  had  been,  could  have  brought  her  and  her  not 
intellectually  brilliant  husband  to  The  Grange.  Every- 
thing was  arranged  for  conversation.  Breakfast  was  a 
function,  and  was  served  on  round  tables,  each  of  a 
conversational  size.  The  last  comer  always  took  Lady 
Ashburton  out  to  dinner,  that  he  might  be  thoroughly 
introduced  into  the  circle. 

Carlyle  2  was  always  there.  He  was  a  great  favourite 
of  Lady  Ashburton.  His  talk  was  like  his  books,  but 
wilder;  in  truth,  his  pessimism  was  monotonous  and 
sometimes  wearisome,  though  he  could  not  fail  to  say 
striking  things,  still  less  to  use  striking  words.  One 
summer  evening  we  came  out  after  dinner  on  the  ter- 

P  Sally  Ward  was  the  daughter  of  Robert  J.  Ward,  of  Kentucky. 
She  is  described  as  "a  radiant  woman,  instinct  with  sparkling  life 
from  the  crown  of  her  beautiful  head  to  the  tips  of  her  slender  feet, 
spoiled,  wilful,  lovely,  and  loving."  Before  she  was  twenty,  she 
married  Bigelow  Lawrence  of  Boston ;  but  applied  for  and  obtained 
a  divorce  within  a  year.  She  had  three  other  husbands.  Died  in 
1898.  —  See  "Famous  American  Belles  of  the  Nineteenth  Century." 
By  Virginia  Tatnall  Peacock.  Philadelphia:  Lippincott.  1901. 
Pp.  148  et  seq.] 

[2  Thomas  Carlyle,  born  1795 ;  died  1881.] 


142  REMINISCENCES 

race.  There  was  a  bright  moon,  and  for  a  few  minutes 
we  all  looked  at  it  in  silence,  each  probably  having  his 
own  thoughts.  At  last  a  voice  was  heard.  "Puirauld 
creature."  Whether  the  moon  was  an  object  of  pity 
in  itself,  or  because  she  was  doomed  to  look  down  on 
human  affairs,  I  failed  to  divine. 

Tennyson  was  there.  I  adored  the  poet,  and  should 
have  liked  to  be  able  to  worship  the  man.  His  self- 
consciousness  and  sensitiveness  to  criticism  were  ex- 
treme. One  of  the  party,  whose  name  I  forget,  but  who 
acted  as  a  sort  of  aide-de-camp  to  Lady  Ashburton, 
asked  me  what  I  thought  of  Tennyson.  I  said  that 
it  was  most  interesting  to  meet  him.  "But  is  he  not 
very  sensitive?  "  "Sensitive  !  I  should  think  he  was. 
If  my  little  girl  were  to  tell  him  that  his  whiskers  were 
ugly,  he  wouldn't  forget  it  for  a  month." 

They  asked  Tennyson  to  read  some  of  his  own  poetry 
aloud.  This  he  was  understood  to  be  fond  of  doing. 
But  to  the  general  disappointment  he  refused.  At  his 
side  was  sitting  Carlyle,  who  had  been  publishing  his 
contempt  of  poetry.  Immolating  myself  to  the  public 
cause,  I  went  over  to  Carlyle  and  asked  him  to  come  for 
a  walk  in  the  grounds.  While  we  were  gone,  the  reading 
came  off.  I  was  reminded  of  this  incident,  which  I  had 
long  forgotten,  by  a  reference  to  it  the  other  day  in  the 
Illustrated  London  News. 

Mrs.  Carlyle  was  at  The  Grange.  She  was  a  modest 
personage,  rather  in  the  background.  Nobody  knew 
that  she  was  so  clever  as  her  letters  prove  her  to  have 


LONDON  143 

been.  But  that  Lady  Ashburton  ever  gave  her  serious 
cause  for  unhappiness  I  do  not  in  the  least  believe. 
Lady  Ashburton  was  a  queen,  and  may,  like  other 
Royalties,  have  been  sometimes  a  little  high;  but  she 
was  incapable  of  doing  anything  unfeeling.  I  had  a 
great  respect  for  her  character  as  well  as  admiration  for 
her  wit,  and  have  always  cherished  the  memory  of  the 
message  which  she  sent  me  from  her  death-bed. 

In  the  circle  of  The  Grange  was  to  be  seen  Bishop 
Wilberforce.  He  had  good  right  to  be  there,  for  he  was 
a  very  brilliant  talker,  especially  happy  in  repartee. 
Of  his  eminent  ability  there  could  be  no  doubt.  He 
would  certainly  have  made  his  mark  as  an  advocate  or 
a  politician.  He  set  out  as  an  Evangelical  like  his 
father ;  he  became,  as  was  natural  for  a  bishop,  a  High 
Churchman.  He  tried  to  combine  both  systems  and 
to  ride  two  horses  with  their  heads  turned  different 
ways.  This  in  itself  gave  him,  perhaps  undeservedly, 
an  air  of  duplicity  and  a  nickname.  He  was,  however, 
morbidly  desirous  of  influence,  which  he  seemed  even  to 
cultivate  without  definite  object.  It  was  said  that  he 
would  have  liked  to  be  on  the  committee  of  every  Club 
in  London.  He  had  the  general  reputation  of  not  being 
strictly  veracious;  nor,  as  I  had  once  occasion  to  see, 
was  he,  when  Church  party  was  in  question,  inflexibly 
just.  He  turned  upon  the  Hampden  question  l  when 
he  found  that  his  course  was  giving  offence  at  Court, 

[l  That  is,  the  appointment  of  the  Reverend  Renn  Dickson  Hamp- 
den to  the  see  of  Hereford,  1847.] 


144  REMINISCENCES 

and  was  upbraided  with  tergiversation  by  his  party. 
He  turned  upon  the  Irish  Church  question  just  in  time 
to  be  promoted  from  Oxford  to  Winchester,  and  to 
what  he  probably  coveted  more  than  the  income,  the 
Chancellorship  of  the  Garter;  and  when  he  put  forth  a 
pathetic  valedictory  assuring  the  clergy  of  Oxford  that 
he  was  agonized  at  leaving  them,  but  could  not  disobey 
the  call  of  the  Spirit,  he  provoked  a  smile.  There  could 
be  no  question  as  to  his  meritorious  activity  in  his 
diocese.  He  was  at  first  a  fine  preacher,  but  at  last  his 
incessant  activity,  leaving  no  time  for  reading  or 
thought,  impaired  the  matter  of  his  sermons  and  com- 
pelled him  to  make  up  for  lack  of  substance  by  delivery, 
of  which,  having  an  admirable  voice  and  manner,  he 
remained  a  perfect  master.  Too  much  allowance  can 
hardly  be  made  for  the  difficulties  of  the  Mitre  in  those 
times. 

A  very  different  realm  from  The  Grange  was  Straw- 
berry Hill,  where  reigned  Frances,  Lady  Waldegrave,1 
whose  husband,  Lord  Carlingford,2  and  I  were  College 
friends.  To  the  sham  Gothic  mansion  built  by  the 
virtuoso  Horace  Walpole  on  the  bank  of  the  Thames 
had  been  added  an  enchanted  castle  of  pleasure,  with 
gorgeous  salons  and  magnificent  grounds  for  out-of- 
door  f6tes  stretching  along  the  river.  Frances,  Lady 
Waldegrave,  had  been  four  times  wedded.  Thrice, 


P  Frances  Elizabeth  Anne,  Countess  Waldegrave.     1821-1879.] 
[2  Chichester  Samuel  Fortesque,  afterwards  Parkinson-Fortesque, 
Baron  Carlingford,  1823-1898.] 


LONDON  145 

it  was  said,  she  had  married  for  title  or  wealth;  the 
fourth  time  for  love.  She  was  a  rather  florid  beauty, 
taking  perhaps  to  an  elderly  man.  In  her  fourth  wed- 
lock she  had  chosen  well,  for  Carlingford  was  a  man  of 
whom  she  might  be  proud,  since  he  became  a  Cabinet 
Minister,  and  at  the  same  time  a  domestic  pillow.  He 
was  an  Irishman,  and  when  in  the  theatre  at  Dublin 
the  jocular  crowd  asked  his  spouse  which  of  her  four 
husbands  she  liked  best,  she  could  turn  their  imperti- 
nence to  plaudits  by  saying,  "The  Irishman,  of  course." 
She  was  the  daughter  of  Braham  1  the  singer,  and  one  of 
the  best  of  daughters,  for  in  her  grandeur  she  never 
failed  in  devoted  attachment  to  her  father,  whose 
portrait  hung  conspicuous  upon  her  wall.  Her  am- 
bition was  to  gather  the  whole  of  the  great  world,  Roy- 
alty included,  in  her  salons  at  Strawberry  Hill.  In  this 
she  thoroughly  succeeded.  Curiously  enough,  the  great 
fortune  which  she  had  accumulated  by  her  successive 
marriages  she  had  just  run  through  when  she  died. 
After  her  death,  I  was  staying  with  her  husband  at  the 
place  in  the  country  where  she  was  buried.  There  she 
lay,  with  a  list  of  her  husbands  on  her  monument. 
Her  fourth  husband  could  not  bear  himself  to  take  me 
to  the  grave;  he  had  to  put  me  in  the  hands  of  the 
curate.  Utterly  unlike  to  Harriet  Lady  Ashburton 
was  Frances  Lady  Waldegrave;  yet  Frances  Lady 
Waldegrave,  to  use  Carlyle's  phrase,  was  not  without 
an  eye,  and  she  could  interest  herself  in  other  subjects 

[l  John  Braham,  the  tenor  singer.     1774  (?)-1856.] 


146  REMINISCENCES 

than  balls  and  garden  parties  when  she  had  a  quiet 
hour. 

It  was  a  mark  of  the  difference  between  the  two  social 
monarchies  that  while  at  The  Grange  breakfast,  as  I 
have  said,  was  a  conversational  function  for  which  ar- 
rangements were  made,  at  Strawberry  Hill  you  came 
down  to  breakfast  at  your  own  hour  and  were  served 
separately  from  a  carte.  The  host  and  hostess  did  not 
appear  till  luncheon. 

Now  the  splendour  has  departed  from  Strawberry 
Hill,  from  the  gilded  salons  and  the  magnificent  grounds. 
The  place  has  become  a  tea-garden,  or  something  less 
elysian  still.  Sic  transit  gloria  mundi. 

In  a  mansion  close  to  Strawberry  Hill  lived  in  luxu- 
rious exile  the  Due  d'Aumale  *  and  the  Comte  de  Paris.2 
D'Aumale,  it  seemed  to  me,  would  have  made  a  strong 
Pretender;  he  was  a  soldier  and  a  man  of  action,  highly 
cultivated  withal.  But  he  was  not  the  heir,  and  it 
seems  that  when  he  got  back  to  France  he  gave  himself 
up  to  pleasure.  The  Comte  de  Paris  was  a  gentle 
creature  who  never  could  have  made  a  Pretender  with- 
out a  Morny 3  to  play  his  game. 

Among  the  intellectual  magnates  who  were  kind  to 
me  I  must  not  forget  Lord  Stanhope.4  I  spent  some 

P  Henri  Eugene  Philippe  Louis  d'Or!6ans,  Due  d'Aumale,  fourth 
son  of  Louis  Philippe ;  born  1822.] 

[2  Louis  Philippe  Albert  d'Orleans,  Comte  de  Paris,  grandson  of 
Louis  Philippe.  1838-1894.] 

[3  Charles  Auguste  Louis  Joseph,  Due  de  Morny,  hah*  brother  of 
Napoleon  III ;  a  leading  spirit  in  the  coup  d'etat  of  December,  1851.] 

[*  Philip  Henry  Stanhope,  fifth  Earl  Stanhope,  author  of  ."His- 


LONDON  147 

very  pleasant  days  at  Chevening  *  with  a  literary  com- 
pany, two  members  of  which  were  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Grote.2 
Grote  was  quiet  and  retiring.  Mrs.  Grote  was  un- 
retiring,  a  rather  formidable  woman  with  a  very  sharp 
wit.  Stanhope's  History  is  not  a  masterpiece;  but  it 
is  interesting  and  fair,  the  work  of  a  man  of  sense  and 
a  gentleman.  The  last  qualification  is  valuable  to  an 
historian  of  the  politics  of  aristocratic  days. 

Hard  by  lived  also  my  great  friend  Grant  Duff,3  a 
most  accomplished  politician  and  man  of  the  world, 
whose  name  calls  up  the  memory  of  pleasant  hours. 
When  he  was  leaving  for  his  government  in  India,  we 
gave  him  a  farewell  banquet  at  a  great  hotel.  I,  having 
come  some  distance,  took  a  bed  there.  In  the  morning 
I  was  awakened  by  a  knock  at  my  door  and  a  female 
voice  offering  me  brandy  and  soda.  The  more  I  de- 
clined the  cup  of  health,  the  more  pressingly  it  was 
offered.  Was  it  intended  for  some  other  revellers, 
or  was  it  taken  for  granted  that  those  who  had  dined 
there  overnight  must  want  brandy  and  soda  in  the 
morning? 

From  Chevening  we  visited  Knole,  the  country  seat 

tory  of  the  War  of  Succession  in  Spain  "  ;  "History  of  England  from 
the  Peace  of  Utrecht  to  the  Peace  of  Versailles  "  ;  "History  of  Eng- 
land comprising  the  Reign  of  Queen  Anne  until  the  Peace  of 
Utrecht "  ;  etc.  1805-1875.] 

P  The  seat  of  the  Earls  Stanhope,  at  Sevenoaks.] 
[2  George  Grote,   the  historian  of  Greece.     1794-1871.  —  Mrs. 
Grote  had  been  Harriet  Lewin.] 

[3  James  Grant  Duff,  Bombay  Grenadiers ;  Resident  of  Poona ;  .'' 
Resident  of  Sattara;  published  a  "History  of  the  Mahrattas."  . 
1789-1858.] 


148  REMINISCENCES 

of  Lord  Sackville  1  near  Sevenoaks.  I  there  found  a 
portrait  of  Walsingham  2  which  confirmed  me  in  the 
belief  that  a  portrait  which  on  leaving  Oxford  I  made 
over  to  the  Bodleian,  it  having  passed  for  a  portrait  of 
Sir  Thomas  Bodley,3  was  really  a  portrait  of  Elizabeth's 
great  Secretary  of  State.  Each  portrait  has  the  des- 
patch symbolical  of  the  Secretaryship,  as  the  white 
wand  is  of  the  Treasurership,  in  its  hand.  The  date 
of  the  subject's  age  on  the  picture  does  not  exactly 
agree  with  Bodley 's  age.  The  date  of  Walsingham's 
birth  is  uncertain.  His  monument  in  St.  Paul's  was 
destroyed  by  fire. 

A  party  at  a  country  house  was  seldom  complete  with- 
out Hayward,4  the  prince  of  anecdotists  and  the  great 
authority  on  social  history  and  gossip.  His  anecdotes 
certainly  gained  embellishment  by  repetition,  and  were, 
therefore,  perhaps  more  amusing  than  authentic.  He 
was  fond  of  dissolving  the  false  pearls  of  history  and 
destroying  heroic  illusions.  It  was  with  much  gusto 
that  he  assured  us  that  Pitt's  last  words  were,  not  "Oh ! 
my  country!  how  I  leave  my  country!"  but,  "I  think 
I  could  eat  one  of  Bellamy's  meat  pies."  Disraeli, 
whom  he  must  in  some  way  have  offended,  has  alluded 

[l  Mortimer  Saekville-West,  first  Baron  Sackville.] 
P  Sir  Francis  Walsingham,  the  Elizabethan  statesman.     1530(  ?)- 
1590.] 

P  The  founder  of  the  Bodleian  Library  at  Oxford.     1545-1613.] 
[4  Abraham  Hayward,  the  essayist ;  author  of  "  The  Art  of  Din- 
ing," "  Sketches  of  Eminent  Statesmen  and  Writers,"  and  of  three 
series  of  Essays ;  editor  of  Mrs.  Piozzi's  "Autobiography,"   etc. 
1801-1884.] 


LONDON  149 

| 

to  him  in  "Lothair"  as  "a  little  parasite."  Little  he 
was  in  stature,  but  he  was  no  parasite ;  on  the  contrary 
he  bore  himself  very  much  as  the  master  of  the  circle. 
He  was  a  bachelor;  his  pen  must  have  brought  him. an 
income;  and  as  he  had  many  friends  among  the  po- 
litical leaders,  he  could  have  got  an  appointment,  if  he 
had  needed  it.  But  he,  no  doubt,  prized  his  freedom. 
I  had  a  good  friend  in  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  Mr.  Denison,1  afterwards  Lord  Ossington, 
through  whose  interest  I  enjoyed  debates.  He  would 
always  get  me  under  the  gallery  or  in  some  place  on  the 
floor  of  the  House.  It  is  on  the  floor  of  the  House  only 
that  a  debate  can  be  enjoyed.  I  shall  have  occasion 
further  on  to  mention  one  or  two  of  the  great  speakers. 
Of  those  I  heard  the  general  level  did  not  seem  to  me  to 
be  high.  There  was  great  waste  of  time  in  droning 
through  speeches  which  were  mere  dilutions  of  the  morn- 
ing's editorials.  Why  cannot  each  speaker,  except  the 
leaders,  instead  of  wandering  over  the  whole  subject, 
take  a  point  and  press  it  home  ?  The  whole  discussion, 
however,  is  little  more  than  a  great  party  demonstra- 
tion. The  name  "deliberative  assembly"  is  a  mockery. 
On  any  party  question  there  is  no  more  deliberation 
than  there  is  in  the  interchange  of  volleys  between  two 
lines  of  battle.  Besides,  every  one  is  talking  less  to  the 
House  than  to  the  Reporters.  While  I  am  in  a  fault- 
finding mood  I  may  say  that  the  House,  and  still  more 

p  John  Evelyn  Denison,  first  Viscount  Ossington,  Speaker  from 
1857  to  1872.] 


150  REMINISCENCES 

the  House  of  Lords,  is  too  highly  decorated  for  a  hall  of 
debate,  where  nothing  should  divert  the  eye  from  the 
speaker.  Ventilation  and  acoustics  at  that  time  were 
bad.  It  seems  that  architectural  science  has  not  yet 
learned  to  produce  with  certainty  a  room  in  which  you 
can  be  heard,  a  place  in  which  you  can  breathe,  or  a 
chimney  which  will  not  smoke.  The  acoustics  of  the 
House  of  Lords  were  worse  than  those  of  the  House  of 
Commons.  It  was  said  that  the  leader  of  the  Opposi- 
tion went  out  and  bought  an  evening  paper  to  learn 
what  the  head  of  the  Government  was  talking  about. 
During  the  passage  of  the  Oxford  University  Bill  I  was 
placed  on  the  steps  of  the  throne  to  watch  the  Bill  and 
communicate  with  the  Minister  in  charge.  On  that 
spot,  where  nobody  sits,  you  could  hear  the  speakers  on 
both  sides  well. 

I  enjoyed  the  theatre,  and  had  in  Patrick  Comyn  l 
[sic]  and  Smyth  Pigott 2  pleasant  companions  to  add  to 
my  enjoyment.  Of  all  the  acting  that  I  saw  the  grand- 
est was  that  of  Ristori 3  in  " Gamma  " ;  above  all,  in  the 

[l  Patrick  Cumin,  C.B.,  was  the  son  of  William  Cumin,  M.D., 
of  Clifton  (so  the  Annual  Register;  the  Alumni  Oxonienses  says 
Glasgow).  He  graduated  at  Oxford  (Balliol  College)  in  1845 ; 
took  his  M.A.  in  1850 ;  was  a  Barrister-at-Law  of  the  Inner  Temple  ; 
and  was  for  many  years  Secretary  of  the  Education  Department 
of  the  Privy  Council.  He  is  described  to  me  as  "a  pleasant  friend 
and  an  energetic  official."  Died  on  the  llth  of  January,  1890, 
aged  65.] 

[2  Edward  Francis  Smyth  Pygott,  for  twenty  years  in  the  Lord 
Chamberlain's  Department  as  Examiner  of  Stage  Plays.  Born  in 
1824;  died  February  23rd,  1895.] 

P  Adelaide  Ristori,  Marquise  Capranica  del  Grillo,  the  celebrated 
Italian  tragedienne;  born  in  1821.] 


LONDON  151 

famous  scene  in  which  Gamma  elicits  the  secret  of  her 
husband's  murder  by  affecting  love  of  the  murderer, 
then  entices  him  to  drinking  the  poisoned  cup,  drinks 
of  it  herself,  and  dies.  The  plot,  which  is  from  Plu- 
tarch, Tennyson  has  taken  for  his  "Cup."  Of  Rachel * 
Matthew  Arnold  has  said  that  she  began  where  Sara 
Bernhardt  ended.  She  was  passion,  especially  of  the 
satanic  kind,  incarnate.  "Adrienne  Lecouvreur"  was 
her  topping  part,  and  the  death  scene,  for  which  she  was 
supposed  to  have  studied  in  a  hospital,  was  her  topping 
scene.  Her  direct  opposite  was  the  female  star  of  the 
English  stage,  Helen  Faucit,2  who  was  all  tenderness. 
About  Wigan, 3  our  male  star,  there  seems  to  have  been 
a  difference  of  opinion.  His  friends  asserted  that  he 
alone  could  act  a  gentleman;  his  critics  said  the  re- 
verse. Some  of  the  opera  people  acted  as  well  as  sang 
well ;  Jenny  Lind  4  did  in  pieces  that  suited  her,  such  as 
"Gazza  Ladra"  and  "Figlia  del  Regimento."  Some- 
thing was  missed  when,  having  renounced  opera,  she 
sang  at  concerts.  Tietjens  5  also  acted  well  in  such  a 
part  as  "Lucrezia  Borgia";  while  her  companion  Al- 
boni,6  supreme  and  rapturously  applauded  as  a  singer, 

P  Elisa  Felix,  called  Rachel,  the  great  French  actress.  1821- 
1858.  — Matthew  Arnold's  saying  is  in  his  Essay  on  "The  French 
Play  in  London."  See  his  "Works"  (Edition  de  luxe),  vol.  xi, 
p.  205.  London  :  Macmillan ;  and  Smith  Elder.] 

[2  Helena  Saville  Faucit,  afterwards  Lady  Martin  (wife  of  Sir 
Theodore  Martin).  1817-1898.] 

[»  Alfred  Sydney  Wigan.     1814-1878.] 

[4  Johanna  Maria  Lind,  married  Mr.  Otto  Goldschmidt.  1820- 
1887.] 

[5  Teresa  Tietjens,  or  Titiens,  a  German  singer.    1834-1877.] 

[6  Marietta  Alboni,  a  celebrated  Italian  singer ;  born  in  1824.] 


152  REMINISCENCES 

stalked  the  stage  in  her  tabard  with  the  grace  of  a 
female  elephant.  Jenny  Land's  character  enhanced 
her  popularity.  She  was  no  harpy,  like  other  prima 
donnas,  but  left  something  for  the  lesser  folk.  I  have 
spoken  of  the  friendship  between  Jenny  and  Arthur 
Stanley,  who  was,  like  Johnson,  dead  to  the  charms  of 
music,  and  said  that  the  only  thing  that  pleased  him  was 
a  drum  solo.  Where  he  could  have  heard  a  drum  solo  we 
never  could  ascertain.  Mario 1  and  Grisi 2  having  spent 
the  fortunes  which  they  had  made,  they  were  forced 
to  return  to  the  stage.  But  superannuated  as  they 
were,  I  fancy  their  audience,  though  it  received  them 
well,  took  more  pleasure  in  seeing  than  in  hearing  them. 

Charles  Kean3  acted  " Hamlet"  with  applause;  yet, 
I  thought,  not  well.  Shakespeare  is  a  philosophic  poet 
as  well  as  a  dramatist,  and  sometimes  transcends  the 
dramatic  sphere.  Perhaps  one  who  had  the  sensibility 
to  feel  the  part  of  Hamlet  would  scarcely  have  the 
nerve  to  act  it.  The  best  Hamlet  I  ever  saw  was  that 
of  the  German  Devrient,4  who  did  at  all  events  solilo- 
quize the  soliloquy,  not  declaim  it. 

I  enjoyed  a  visit  to  Sadler's  Wells,5  the  people's 


P  Joseph  Mario,  called  Marquis  dei  Candia,  called  "a  lyric  artist." 
1810-1833.  —  He  married  Grisi.] 

[2  Giulia  Grisi,  dame  Gerard  de  Melcy.  She  was  a  sister  of 
Giuditta  Grisi,  the  singer ;  and  a  cousin  of  Carlotta  Grisi,  the  dancer. 
1812-1869.] 

[3  Charles  John  Kean,  second  son  of  Edmund.     1811  ( ?)-1868.] 

[4  It  is  difficult  to  determine  which,  among  the  many  actors  who 
bore  this  name,  is  meant.  Perhaps  Gustave  Emile,  who  died  at 
Dresden  in  1872.]  [5  In  Islington.] 


LONDON  153 

theatre,  long  since  improved  out  of  existence.  It  was 
pleasant  to  see  the  loyalty  of  the  people  to  Shake- 
speare. The  taste  of  the  people,  being  simple,  is  sound. 
Phelps,1  at  Sadler's  Wells,  was  a  fine  declaimer.  He 
gave  well  Prosperous  speech  in  "The  Tempest." 

But  all  the  theatres,  and  especially  Sadler's  Wells, 
suffered  from  Charles  Kean's  fancy  for  spectacle.  He 
imagined  that  Shakespeare  was  an  antiquarian,  and  put 
on  his  plays  in  the  garb  of  the  historic  period.  So  we 
had  the  Duke  of  Athens,  who  to  Shakespeare  was  like  a 
Duke  of  Milan,  talking  of  nunneries;  fairies  in  Athe- 
nian groves ;  and  two  Athenian  gentlemen  going  out  to 
fight  a  duel  with  Grecian  swords.  In " Macbeth"  we 
had  the  rude  simplicity  of  primitive  Scotland,  and  the 
throne,  to  which  Macbeth's  ambition  climbed  through 
treason  and  murder,  was  a  wooden  stool.  Shakespeare 
paid  no  more  respect  to  historical  character  than  to 
geography,  and  he  had  no  scenery  at  all. 

I  was  in  a  box  at  the  opera  one  evening,  with  two 
friends.  The  party  next  night  was  to  meet  again.  I 
arrived  first.  Presently  one  of  the  other  two  came  in. 
I  asked  after  the  third,  and  was  horrified  by  the  reply 
that  he  had  shot  himself  that  afternoon.  The  evening 
before  he  had  apparently  been  in  the  best  of  spirits.  He 
was  young  and  wealthy.  I  never  learned  the  cause  of 
his  weariness  of  life.  The  weather  was  very  sultry  and 
bad  for  the  liver. 

t1  Samuel  Phelps,  who  "made  Shakespeare  pay  "  for  nearly  twenty 
years  at  Sadler's  Wells.  Born  1804 ;  died  1878.] 


154  REMINISCENCES 

Having  spoken  of  E.  S.  Pigott,  I  may  say  that  he  was 
very  intimate  with  Dickens,  whom  I  only  once  saw, 
and  whom  I  understood  it  was  difficult  to  meet,  as  he 
lived  very  much  in  a  choice  circle  of  his  intimate 
friends.  Pigott  told  me  his  opinion  of  the  unhappy 
relations  between  Dickens  and  his  wife,  which  came  too 
much  before  the  world.  It  was  a  common  case ;  Dick- 
ens had  married  at  a  low  level,  and  his  wife  had  not 
risen  with  him;  otherwise,  according  to  Pigott,  an 
excellent  judge,  there  was  no  fault  on  her  side.  The 
matrimonial  history  of  writers  of  works  of  imagination 
has  often  been  unhappy.  Their  imagination  turns  a 
woman  into  an  angel,  and  then  they  find  that  she  is  a 
woman.  About  this  time  the  scandalous  world  was 
being  regaled  with  the  war  between  Bulwer  1  and  his 
wife.  When  Bulwer  was  being  elected  at  Hertford,2 
his  consort  drove  up  in  a  post-chaise,  mounted  the 
hustings,  and  delivered  a  philippic  against  him.  Their 
son  was  credited  with  some  lines  on  the  occasion :  — 

Who  came  to  Hertford  in  a  chaise, 
And  uttered  anything  but  praise, 
About  the  author  of  my  days  ? 
My  Mother. 

If  Dickens's  own  home  was  not  happy,  few  writers 
have  done  more  to  make  other  homes  happy  and  dif- 
fuse kindly  feelings.  His  "  Christmas  Carol"  is  an 
Evangel. 

P  Edward  George  Earle  Lytton  Bulwer-Lytton,  first  Baron  Lyt- 
ton,  the  novelist.     1803-1873.] 
[2  June  the  8th,  1858.] 


LONDON  155 

I  became  intimate  with  some  of  the  exiles  driven  to 
England  by  the  political  storms  of  Europe.  Among 
them  was  Louis  Blanc,  of  whom  I  saw  a  good  deal. 
I  took  more  to  the  Italian  exiles/  Mazzini,  Saffi,  and 
Arrivabene,  whose  cause,  that  of  Italian  independence, 
was  perfectly  pure.  To  Mazzini,  whose  acquaintance 
I  formed  at  the  house  of  Sir  James  Stansfield,2  I  took 
very  much.  He  seemed  to  me  a  genuine  servant  of 
humanity,  regarding  Italian  nationality,  to  the  rescue 
of  which  he  gave  his  life,  as  subservient  to  the  general 
good  of  mankind.  He  denied  that  he  had  been  con- 
cerned in  any  assassination  plot.  With  Garibaldi 3  I 
exchanged  letters,  but  we  never  met.  He  was  coming 
to  Oxford  and  to  my  house  when  he  was  suddenly 
whisked  out  of  the  country,  by  what  influence  is  a 
mystery  to  this  hour.  For  myself,  I  never  doubted 
that  it  was  by  the  influence  of  the  Queen.  Victoria 
was  a  Stuart  upon  a  Hanoverian  throne.  A  friend  of 
mine  at  Court  heard  Disraeli  feeding  with  slanderous 
stories  her  hatred  of  Garibaldi.  She  bitterly  hated 
Bismarck  also  for  having  put  an  end  to  the  Kingdom  of 
Hanover.  Perhaps  that  may  have  been  partly  the 
account  of  her  sympathy  with  France  against  Germany. 
The  French  Emperor/  to  whose  influence  some  sus- 

f1  See  footnotes  on  page  96  ;   Chapter  VI.] 

[2  Sir  James  Stansfield,  Liberal  M.P. ;  held  high  political  posts ; 
strong  upholder  of  the  cause  of  Italian  unity.  1820-1898.] 

f3  Giuseppe  Garibaldi,  the  celebrated  Italian  patriot,  was  born 
at  Nice  in  1807,  and  died  in  1882.] 

[4  Napoleon  III.] 


156  REMINISCENCES 

pected  the  spiriting-away  of  Garibaldi  was  due,  had  in 
him  still  something  of  the  Revolutionist  and  an  eye  to 
possible  assistance  from  that  side. 

Two  famous  relics  of  a  political  generation  gone  by, 
Brougham 1  and  Lyndhurst,2  I  just  saw.  Lyndhurst 
I  heard  make  a  speech  in  the  House  of  Lords,  too  cur- 
sory for  the  display  of  his  mighty  reasoning  powers. 
It  was  curious  to  see  a  man  who  had  been  at  Boston  a 
British  subject  before  the  American  Revolution. 

Nothing  can  adequately  paint  the  galvanic  motions 
of  Brougham's  face  and  figure.  His  activity  and  pro- 
ductiveness, as  is  well  known,  were  miraculous.  He  as- 
pired to  leadership  not  only  in  law,  politics,  and  litera- 
ture, but  in  science.  Lord  Stanhope  used  to  tell  a 
story  of  the  editor  of  a  new  magazine  who  humbly 
petitioned  Brougham  for  an  article  to  grace  his  first 
number.  The  happy  man  received  three  articles  by 
return  of  post !  Brougham's  private  secretary,  Sir 
Denis  le  Marchant,3  told  me  that  Brougham,  when  he 
was  leading  at  once  in  the  Bar  and  in  Parliament,  mak- 
ing one  speech  seven  hours  long,  could  do  with  two 
hours'  sleep  each  night.  On  Saturday  afternoon,  he 
would  turn  in  till  Monday  morning.  When  he  was  in 
full  practice  on  the  northern  circuit  and  at  the  same 

[l  Henry  Peter  Brougham,  Baron  Brougham  and  Vaux ;  Lord 
Chancellor.  1778-1868.] 

p  John  Singleton  Copley,  the  younger,  Baron  Lyndhurst ;  Lord 
Chancellor.  1772-1863.] 

[3  Sir  Denis  le  Marchant,  first  Baronet ;  Liberal  M.P.  1795- 
1874.] 


LONDON  157 

time  candidate  for  the  representation  of  Yorkshire  in 
Parliament,  he  would,  after  a  long  day  in  court,  get  into 
a  post-chaise  and  go  very  long  distances  to  election 
meetings.  Summoned  suddenly  to  attend  his  client 
Queen  Caroline  on  a  great  emergency,  he  slept  all  the 
way  in  the  carriage.  For  this  preternatural  activity, 
however,  he  paid  by  long  fits  of  depression.  His 
sister,1  who  was  with  us  at  Mortimer,  was  grotesquely 
like  him  in  all  respects,  and  was  subject  to  the  same  fits 
of  depression,  which,  however,  in  her  case,  were  more 
lasting.  Brougham  was  very  emotional,  and  wept 
bitterly  when  he  heard  of  the  death  of  an  old  political 
associate.  His  attempt  to  revive  his  failing  notoriety 
by  circulating  a  report  of  his  having  been  killed  by  an 
accident  took  in  the  whole  press  except  the  Times. 

Eton  introduced  me,  among  other  houses,  to  that  of 
Lord  Chancellor  Campbell,2  whose  son,  Lord  Strathe- 
den  that  afterwards  was,  and  I  had  been  in  the  same 
boarding-house.  It  was  of  Lord  Campbell  as  the  author 
of  the  " Lives  of  the  Chancellors"  that  Lyndhurst  said 
he  had  added  a  pang  to  death.  He  may  not  be  strictly 
accurate  or  impartial,  but  his  book  is  racy  of  the  pro- 
fession. It  was  to  Campbell  that  was  due  the  putting 
the  plaintiff  in  a  libel  case  into  the  witness-box.  It 
seems  doubtful  whether  he  did  well.  The  consequence 
is  apt  to  be,  instead  of  the  trial  of  the  defendant  for  his 

f1  Query.  —  According  to  Burke,  Henry,  first  Lord  Brougham 
and  Vaux,  had  no  sister.] 

[2  John  Campbell,  first  Baron  Campbell,  Lord  Chancellor.  1779- 
1861.] 


158  REMINISCENCES 

slander,  the  trial  of  the  person  libelled  on  his  general 
character  and  life. 

I  spent  a  day  with  Lushington,1  Lady  Byron's  Coun- 
sel, but  nothing  was  said  about  the  famous  case.  Lush- 
ington  would  never  speak  of  it.  His  lips  might  be 
sealed  by  professional  duty.  Yet  it  seems  strange  that 
when  the  portentous  version  of  the  matter  adopted  by 
Mrs.  Beecher  Stowe  was  in  circulation,  he  should  not,  if 
he  could  with  truth,  have  denied  that  there  was  any- 
thing more  than  a  matrimonial  quarrel  of  the  common 
kind.  In  my  childhood  I  had  seen  Lushington  chaired 
on  his  election  for  Reading.2 

Blessed  are  Clubs,  and  above  all  Clubs  in  my  memory 
the  Athenaeum,  with  its  splendid  library  and  its  social 
opportunities.  Without  Clubs  what  would  bachelor- 
life  in  London  be?  We  know  pretty  well  from  the 
record  of  days  before  them.  Instead  of  being  de- 
nounced as  hostile  to  marriage,  the  Clubs  ought  to  be 
credited  with  keeping  young  men  fit  for  it.  Even  with 
a  Club,  the  life  of  a  young  man  in  a  city  where  he  has 
no  home  is  not  free  from  danger.  In  trying  many 
years  afterwards  to  assist  in  the  foundation  of  a 
good  Club  for  young  men  in  Toronto,  I  was  acting  on 
observations  made  during  my  own  stay  in  London. 

Without  a  home  in  London,  I  could  myself  hardly 
be  said  to  be.  I  had  something  like  a  home  in  the  house 

f1  Stephen  Lushington.     1782-1873.] 

[2  Lushington  contested  Reading  unsuccessfully  in  1830,  but  was 
next  year  returned  for  Winchelsea  :  perhaps  he  was  chaired  at  Read- 
ing then.  —  Ed.] 


LONDON  159 

of  my  father's  brother-in-law,  the  Rev.  Sir  Henry 
Dukinfield,1  who  had  succeeded  to  the  Baronetcy 
on  the  death  of  his  brother  after  being  for  some  time 
pastor  of  St.  Martin's-in-the-Fields.  Sir  Henry  was  an 
active  and  valued  coadjutor  of  Blomfield,  the  Bishop 
of  London,  a  statesman  prelate  who  strove  to  adapt 
the  Church  to  the  times  and  renew  her  hold  upon  the 
nation  not  by  reviving  her  claims  to  priestly  authority, 
but  by  placing  her  in  the  van  of  social  improvement. 
He  was  the  apostle  of  public  baths  and  wash-houses.2 
His  wife,  Lady  Dukinfield,3  was  my  ideal  of  a  lovely 
and  graceful  English  woman.  Nor  was  her  character 
less  graceful  than  her  form  and  manner.  Her  portrait 4 
bears  me  out.  La  belle  Anglaise,  she  had  been  called 
in  France,  and  her  beauty  was  of  the  kind  that  loses 
least  by  age.  She  was  a  niece  of  Craufurd,5  Welling- 
ton's Peninsula  General.  Her  father  was  a  diplo- 

I1  See  note  at  the  foot  of  the  first  page  of  Chapter  II.] 

[2  "He  suggested  the  passing  of  the  Act  of  Parliament  (9th  and 
10th  Viet.  c.  74),  which  is  generally  called  by  his  name,  empowering 
vestries  to  raise  money  on  the  parish  rates  for  the  erection  and 
support  of  Baths  and  Washhouses  for  the  poor."  —  See  "A  Memoir 
of  the  Rev.  Sir  Henry  Robert  Dukinfield,  Bart."  Printed  for 
Private  Circulation.  London :  W.  H.  Dalton.  1861.  Page  57.] 

[3  She  was  a  daughter  of  Sir  James  Craufurd,  Baronet,  who  was 
British  Resident  at  Hamburg  from  1798  to  1803,  and  afterwards 
Minister  Plenipotentiary  at  Copenhagen.  She  married,  first  Gen- 
eral Chowne ;  second,  Sir  Henry  Dukinfield.] 

[4  By  George  Richmond  (1809-1896).  It  hangs  in  the  drawing- 
room  of  The  Grange  at  Toronto.] 

[5  General  Robert  Craufurd,  third  son  of  Sir  Alexander  Craufurd, 
first  Baronet,  of  Newark,  Ayrshire,  and  brother  of  Sir  Charles 
Gregan-Craufurd,  G.C.B.  Born  1764;  killed  at  Ciudad  Rodrigo, 
January  the  24th,  1812.] 


160  REMINISCENCES 

matist.  She  was  with  him  at  Brussels  at  the  time  of 
Waterloo,  and  was  the  last  survivor  but  one  of  those 
who  had  danced  at  the  famous  Ball.  Her  memory 
was  perfectly  clear.  They  all  knew  that  the  French 
were  advancing.  But  Wellington,  to  prevent  a  panic, 
had  desired  that  the  Ball  might  take  place.  The  lodg- 
ings of  Lady  Dukinfield's  father  were  opposite  to  the 
quarters  of  the  Duke,  whom  she  saw  mount  his  horse 
and  ride  forth.  She  also  saw  the  Guards,  her  brother's 
regiment,  march  out.  On  the  day  of  Waterloo,  she 
and  her  father  were  dining  with  the  Prince  de  Conde,1 
when  news  came  that  the  British  were  totally  defeated 
and  the  French  were  marching  on  Brussels.  The 
Prince  called  for  his  horses  and  went  off  to  Ghent. 
Lady  Dukinfield's  father  hurried  her  home,  but  found 
that  his  horses  had  been  stolen.  They  presently  got 
horses  and  set  out  for  Ghent,  finding  the  road  blocked 
with  fugitives.  Before  they  reached  Ghent  they  were 
overtaken  by  news  of  the  victory.  I  did  not  ask  Lady 
Dukinfield  where  the  ball  had  taken  place.  Prince 
Leopold  afterwards  heard  her  story,  and  I  believe 
took  a  note  of  it.  He  may  have  asked  the  question. 

Sir  Henry,  a  clergyman  and  a  devout  one,  one  day  let 
fall  the  remark  that  a  man's  religious  reputation  must 
be  very  high  to  enable  him  to  refuse  a  challenge  to  a 
duel.  I  note  this  to  mark  the  change  of  sentiment. 

P  Louis  Joseph  de  Bourbon,  Prince  de  Conde.    1736-1818.] 


CHAPTER  XI 

JOURNALISM 

' 1855-1858 

Peel  —  The   Saturday  Review  —  Members  of    the  Staff  —  Froude 
—  Letters  on  the  Empire. 

LIVING  in  London  with  leisure,  I  was  drawn  into 
journalism,  and  at  the  same  time  into  a  political  con- 
nection. I  wrote  some  articles  in  the  Morning  Chroni- 
cle, the  organ  of  the  Peelites,  as  the  section  of  the  Con- 
servative party,  comprising  Gladstone,  the  Duke  of 
Newcastle,1  Sidney  Herbert,2  Cardwell,3  and  Canning,4 
which  had  adhered  to  Peel,  was  called. 

I  had  the  greatest  respect  for  Peel  as  a  thoroughly 
wise  and  patriotic  statesman,   while   I  loathed  the 
"blackguard  combination,"  as  Wellington  justly  called 
it,  of  office-seeking  Whigs  and  Corn-Law  Tories,  the 
work  of  Disraeli,  by  which  the  Peel  Government  was 
overthrown.     Disraeli,  who  had  fawned  on  Peel  in  his 
"Letters  of  Runnymede,"  6  now  turned  round  and  as- 
sailed him  with  rancorous  and  slanderous  abuse. 

II  Henry  Pelham,  fifth  Duke  of  Newcastle.    1811-1864.] 

[2  Sidney  Herbert,  first  Baron  Herbert  of  Lea.    1810-1861.] 

[J  Edward,  Viscount  Cardwell.    1813-1886.] 

[4  Charles  John,  afterwards  Earl  Canning ;  Governor-General 
of  India  during  the  Mutiny.  Born  in  1812 ;  died  in  1862.] 

[B  "The  Letters  of  Runnymede."  London:  John  Macrone,  St. 
James's  Square.  MDCCCXXXVI.] 

M  161 


162  REMINISCENCES 

I  presently  found  myself  on  the  regular  staff  of  the 
Saturday  Review.  The  editor  and  one  of  the  proprie- 
tors was  John  Douglas  Cook,1  a  singular  character.  He 
was  a  sort  of  filius  terror.  What  his  early  history  had 
been,  we  never  could  clearly  learn ;  it  appeared  that  he 
had  been  in  India ;  it  was  certain  that  he  had  been  on 
the  Times.  He  had  edited  the  Morning  Chronicle 
during  its  short  life  as  a  Liberal-Conservative  organ. 
He  was  a  rough  strong  man,  without  literary  culture 
or  faculty.  But  he  had  great  newspaper  tact.  Though 
he  could  not  write  himself,  he  instinctively  knew  good 
writing.  His  courage  and  self-possession  were  im- 
perturbable. Unrefined  though  he  was,  I  became  at- 
tached to  him,  and  I  cherish  his  memory.  Our  other 
proprietor  was  Alexander  Beresford-Hope,2  a  very 
wealthy  man,  highly  cultivated,  to  whom  I  fancy  the 
Review  was  a  sort  of  literary  yacht,  though  he  was  a 
High  Churchman  and  inspired  the  religious  department 
of  the  paper  in  that  sense.  He  was  generally  supposed 
to  have  been  a  member  of  the  Young  England  party  got 
up  by  Disraeli,  of  which  Lord  John  Manners  3  was  the 
most  prominent  member,  and  which  is  advertised  in 
"Coningsby";  but  this  he  always  denied.  He  was 
the  son  of  Hope  4  the  millionaire,  and  had  married  a 

P  John  Douglas  Cook,  born  in  Aberdeenshire  1808 (?) ;  died  in 
1868.] 

[2  Alexander  James  Beresford-Hope,  politician  and  author.  1820- 
1887.] 

P  Charles  Cecil  John  Manners,  sixth  Duke  of  Rutland.  1815-1888.] 

[*  Thomas  Hope,  author  and  virtuoso ;  belonged  to  the  rich 
family  of  Amsterdam  merchants.  1770  (?)-1831.] 


JOURNALISM  163 

daughter  of  Lord  Salisbury,1  a  woman  bright  and  brave. 
"Bedgebury"  was  a  sumptuous  chateau.  In  those 
days  there  were  thirty  acres  of  kept  grass,  with  two 
men  and  a  donkey  always  employed  upon  them. 
But  sumptuosity  was  not  the  best  of  it. 

The  other  members  of  the  original  staff,  if  I  remember 
rightly,  were  George  Venables ; 2  Maine,3  afterwards 
Sir  Henry  Maine,  the  historical  jurist;  Lord  Robert 
Cecil,  afterwards  Marquis  of  Salisbury;4  Hemming;5 
Collett  Sandars ; 6  and  Scott,7  a  clergyman,  called,  from 
his  cure,  Scott  of  Hoxton.  It  was  afterwards,  I  be- 
lieve, that  Sir  William  Harcourt8  joined  the  staff. 
George  Venables  and  Lord  Robert  Cecil  were  the  chief 
political  writers.  Sandars  wrote  the  articles  on  social 
subjects,  for  which  he  had  a  fine  touch. 

[*  Lady  Mildred  Arabella  Charlotte  Henrietta  Cecil,  eldest 
daughter  of  James,  second  Marquess  of  Salisbury.  1822-1881.] 

[2  George  Stovin  Venables,  Fellow  of  Jesus  College,  Cambridge ; 
barrister ;  journalist.  Born  1810 ;  died  1888.] 

[3  Sir  Henry  James  Sumner  Maine.    1822-1888.] 

[4  Robert  Arthur  Talbot  Gascoyne  Cecil,  third  Marquess  of  Salis- 
bury. 1830-1903.] 

[5  Py&tt&dj  George  Wirgman  Hemming,   Fellow  of  St.  John's 
College,  Cambridge,  Senior  Wrangler,  took  his  A.B.  Degree  in  1844,  ft  tvylfl 
and  proceeded  A.M.  in  1847 ;   a  Q.C. ;   for  some  years  Counsel  for         t,***J 
the  University ;   one  of  the  Official  Referees  of  the  Supreme  Court 
of  Judicature  ;  Master  of  the  Library  of,  and  Treasurer  of,  Lincoln's 
Inn.] 

[6  Thomas  Collett  Sandars,  a  Barrister ;  editor  of  Justinian's 
."Institutes."  1825-1894.] 

P  The  Rev.  William  Scott,  Vicar  of  St.  Olave's,  Jewry,  London. 
1813-1872.] 

[8  The  Right  Hon'ble  Sir  William  George  Granville  Venables- 
Vernon-Harcourt ;  Solicitor-General,  1873 ;  Home  Secretary,  1880 ; 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  1885  and  1892.  Born  1827  ;  died  1904.] 


164  REMINISCENCES 

Scott,  a  special  ally  of  Hope,  wrote  the  articles  on 
Church  questions.  Hemming  was  supposed  to  take 
finance.  But  when  he  and  I,  by  strange  and  pleasant 
chance,  met  after  many  years  in  the  Park  at  Toronto 
and  talked  over  our  old  literary  comradeship,  he  told 
me  that  this  impression  was  a  mistake.  Lord  Robert 
Cecil  had  incurred  his  father's  displeasure,  by  his  mar- 
riage with  a  daughter  of  Baron  Alderson,1  an  extremely 
clever  woman  who  was  supposed  privately  to  help  us 
with  her  pen.  Something  of  the  Saturday  Reviewer  was 
afterwards  discernible  in  Lord  Salisbury's  speeches, 
perhaps  not  to  his  political  advantage ;  for  that  which 
would  be  smart  in  an  article  may  be  too  smart  in  a  Min- 
ister's speech.  He  offended  the  Irish  vote  by  a  philo- 
sophic remark  on  the  inequalities  of  political  capacity 
and  the  imprudence  of  giving  democratic  institutions 
to  the  Hottentots.  "  Master  of  flouts  and  gibes  and 
sneers  "  he  was  called  by  Disraeli.  As  the  guest  of 
Hope  at  Bedgebury,  where  we  had  very  pleasant  meet- 
ings, I  was  thrown  much  into  Lord  Salisbury's  company, 
and  I  always  felt  and  expressed  more  confidence  in  his 
judgment  and  rectitude  than  in  his  strength.  Bismarck 
in  his  slashing  way  said  of  him  that  he  was  a  reed 2 
painted  to  look  like  iron.  This  was  exaggeration. 
But  Lord  Salisbury  used  to  speak  both  in  public  and 
private  of  Disraeli's  character  and  designs  in  terms 

[l  Georgina  Caroline,  eldest  daughter  of   the  Honourable    Sir 
Edward  Hall  Alderson,  Baron  of  the  Exchequer.] 
[*  Query.  — Lath?] 


JOURNALISM  165 

which  it  might  have  been  thought  would  make  their 
union  impossible.  His  ultimate  submission  to  Disraeli  / 
was  ascribed  to  the  pressure  of  his  aspiring  wife.  His 
consent  to  the  attack  on  the  independence  of  the 
Transvaal  Republic,  being  the  man  of  honour  that  he 
was  and  clearly  committed  on  the  question,  may  prob- 
ably be  ascribed  to  the  dominant  influence  of  Chamber- 
lain. 

The  staff,  or  at  least  the  circle  of  contributors,  was 
afterwards  so  much  enlarged  that  at  the  Saturday 
Review  dinners  at  Richmond  or  Greenwich  it  seemed  as 
if  the  whole  literary  tribe  of  London  were  gathered 
together. 

Douglas  Cook's  policy,  to  which  Beresford-Hope's 
purse  enabled  him  to  give  effect,  was  to  buy  the  very 
best  article,  whatever  might  be  the  necessary  price. 
The  field  was  open ;  The  Spectator  having  declined  after 
the  death  of  Rintoul  * ;  and  the  Saturday  paid,  as  I 
understood,  from  the  first. 

Had  I  written  in  Latin  the  epitaph  of  George  Vena- 
bles,  it  would  have  been  Magnus  Vir,  Si  Emersisset.  It 
was  always  a  mystery  to  me  how  a  man  with  his  ability, 
his  force  of  character,  and  his  political  information, 
could  have  been  content  to  remain  through  life  an 
anonymous  journalist.  I  never  heard  him  make  a 
speech;  but  he  was  said  as  Parliamentary  Counsel  to 
have  spoken  extremely  well.  His  style  as  a  writer  was 

P  Robert  Stephen  Rintoul,  founder  of  The  Spectator.  1787- 
1858.] 


166  REMINISCENCES 

peculiar  and  not  popular.  His  sentences  followed  each 
other  without  connecting  particles,  like  a  succession  of 
pellets  from  a  popgun.  But  his  articles  were  full  of 
weighty  good  sense.  Nor  was  he  without  sardonic  wit. 
When  Thesiger,1  a  popular  man,  but  a  bad  lawyer,  was 
made  Chancellor,  Venables  said,  "Sir  Frederick  The- 
siger is  raised  to  the  Chancellorship  amidst  universal 
sympathy,  which  we  cannot  help  extending  to  the 
suitors."  When  Palmerston,  a  Tory  at  heart,  made  a 
clap-trap  speech,  in  favour  I  think  of  an  extension  of 
the  franchise,  and  Pakington,2  a  professed  Conserva- 
tive, imitated  and  tried  to  cap  him,  Venables  said  that 
if  Pakington's  speech  was  insincere  that  only  increased 
the  servility  of  the  imitation. 

If  any  one  into  whose  hands  the  Saturday  may  since 
have  fallen  fancies  that  its  success  was  due  to  political 
pepper,  he  is  mistaken.  Its  tone  during  its  palmy  days 
was  epicurean,  and  this  was  the  source  of  its  popularity 
in  the  circles  by  which  it  was  chiefly  supported.  It 
was  said  of  us  that  whereas  with  the  generation  of  the 
Reform  Bill,  everything  had  been  new,  everything  had 
been  true,  and  everything  had  been  of  the  highest  im- 
portance, with  us  nothing  was  new,  nothing  was  true, 
and  nothing  was  of  any  importance. 

One  day  Cook  asked  me  whether  I  had  written  a 
review  of  a  book  which  he  had  put  into  my  hands.  I 

[l  Frederick  Thesiger,  first  Baron  Chelmsford ;  Lord  Chancellor 
1858-1859,  and  1866-1868.  Born  1794 ;  died  1878.] 

[*  John  Somerset  Pakington,  first  Baron  Hampton.  (His  real 
name  was  Russell.)  1799-1880.] 


JOURNALISM  167 

replied  that  I  had  read  the  book,  but  that  it  was  not 
worth  reviewing.  "Ah!"  he  said,  "you  are  not  like 
the  others.  If  I  give  them  a  bad  book,  they  cut  it  up ; 
you  tell  me  that  it  is  not  worth  reviewing."  I  somehow 
got  a  false  reputation  for  sharpness  as  a  reviewer.  A 
work  like  Froude's  "Henry  VIII,"  1  not  only  artfully 
palliating  the  detestable  crimes  of  a  despot,  but  art- 
fully blackening  the  memories  of  his  victims  such  as 
More,  Fisher,  and  Pole,  surely  calls  for  reprobation.2  I 
have  always  thought  that  Macaulay  was  inhuman  in 
insisting  on  the  republication  of  his  review  of  poor  Satan 
Montgomery's  poems.3  It  is  a  pity  he  did  not  live  to 
read  Fitzjames  Stephen's  examination  of  his  Life  of 
Warren  Hastings.4  It  might  have  taught  him  mercy. 
Froude  was  undoubtedly  a  man  of  genius.  He  was  a 
most  brilliant  and  fascinating  writer,  and  his  History 
becomes  far  more  historical  when  death  has  rid  him  of 
Henry  VIII.  But  neither  accuracy  nor  justice  ever 
was  his  strong  point.  He  was  very  impossible.  He 
had  set  out  under  the  influence  of  Newman ;  he  ended, 
after  an  interval  of  scepticism,  under  that  of  Carlyle. 


p  James  Anthony  Froude's  "History  of  England  from  the  Fall 
of  Wolsey  to  the  Death  of  Elizabeth."] 

[2  Probably  the  reviews  of  the  first  two  volumes  of  Froude's  His- 
tory of  England  which  appeared  in  the  Saturday  Review  of  April, 
the  26th  and  May  the  3d,  1856,  were  from  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's 
pen.] 

[3  Robert  Montgomery.     1807-1855.] 

t4  "  The  Story  of  Nuncomar  and  the  Impeachment  of  Sir  Elijah 
Impey."  By  *  Sir  James  Fitzjames  Stephen,  K.C.S.I.  .  .  .  Two 
volumes.  London :  Macmillan.  1885.] 


168  REMINISCENCES 

Neither  of  his  prophets  was  likely  to  put  him  in  the  way 
of  plain  truth. 

My  most  important  or  least  unimportant  work  as  a 
journalist,  however,  was  a  series  of  letters  in  the  Daily 
News,  afterwards  reprinted  under  the  title  of  "The 
Empire."  l  It  commenced  with  a  letter  advocating  the 
cession  of  the  Ionian  Islands,  which  were  in  a  chronic 
state  of  discontent,  to  Greece ;  a  measure  favoured  by 
my  political  friends  and  presently  adopted  without 
any  of  the  terrible  effects  predicted  by  the  worshippers 
of  Empire.  The  whole  series  was  anti-Imperialist, 
advocating  the  concession  of  independence  to  adult 
Colonies,  so  that  England  might  become  indeed  the 
mother  of  free  nations.  In  the  debate  on  the  question 
of  the  Ionian  Islands,  Disraeli  attacked  me  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  The  publication  of  his  letter  to  Lord 
Malmesbury,2  then  Foreign  Secretary,  has  shown  that 
he  himself  regarded  "these  wretched  Colonies"  as 
"a  mill-stone  round  our  necks,"  and  held  that  they 
would  "all  be  independent  in  a  few  years."  (Malmes- 
bury's  Memoirs,  i.  344.)  Nor  was  this  a  transient  ebul- 
lition. His  friend  Sir  William  Gregory  tells  us 3  that  he 

[l  "The  Empire.  A  Series  of  Letters  published  in  The  Daily 
News,  1862,  1863."  By  Goldwin  Smith.  Oxford  and  London: 
John  Henry  and  James  Parker.  1863.] 

[2  James  Howard  Harris,  third  Earl  of  Malmesbury.  1807-1889.] 
[3"  .  .  .  as  for  the  colonies,  his  expressions  were  (always  those  of 
contempt  and  a  contented  impression  that  we  should  sooner  or  later 
be  rid  of  them."  -—  "An  Autobiography.  By  Sir  William  Gregory, 
K.C.M.G.,  formerly  Member  of  Parliament  and  sometime  Governor 
of  Ceylon.  Edited  by  Lady  Gregory."  London.  Murray.  1894. 
Page  105.] 


JOURNALISM  169 

held  the  same  language  in  private  to  the  end  of  his  life. 
To  show  how  little  I  shared  Disraeli's  contempt  for  the 
Colonies,  it  was  in  consequence  of  a  suggestion  made  by 
me  to  a  Colonial  Secretary  that  they  were  first  men- 
tioned in  the  Queen's  Speech. 

The  opinions  held  by  me  on  the  Colonial  Question 
were  at  that  time  prevalent;  some  of  our  statesmen 
avowed  them,  more  were  inclined  to  them.  They  were 
undoubtedly  shared  by  my  friend  Sir  Frederic  Rogers,1 
the  permanent  head  of  the  Colonial  Office.  They  were 
certainly  not  deemed  treason  by  my  friend  Godley,2 
the  founder  of  Canterbury,  New  Zealand,  with  whom 
I  had  a  good  deal  of  intercourse  on  colonial  subjects. 
He  was  at  all  events  strongly  in  favour  of  Colonial 
self-government,  and  said  that  he  would  rather  be 
ruled  by  a  Nero  on  the  spot  than  by  a  Board  in  London. 
There  is  now  a  tidal  wave  of  the  opposite  sentiment ; 
but  I  have  more  than  once  in  the  course  of  a  long  life 
stood  on  the  dry  beach  where  a  tidal  wave  had  been.  I 
remain  unshaken  in  my  convictions.  Nor  was  the 
movement  in  which,  through  those  letters,  I  took  part, 
without  important  effect  at  the  time.  A  larger  meas- 
ure of  self-government  was  given  to  the  Colonies;  the 
British  troops  were  withdrawn  from  them ;  and  an  end 
was  put  to  petty  wars  with  Maoris  and  Kaffirs  which 
the  presence  of  the  troops,  by  encouraging  the  aggres- 

P  Frederic  Rogers,  Baron  Blaehford,  Permanent  Under-Secretary 
of  State  for  the  Colonies  from  1860  to  1871.  1811-1889.] 

[2  John  Robert  Godley,  Under-Secretary-at-War.     1814-1861.] 


170  REMINISCENCES 

siveness  of  the  Colonists,  had  fomented  and  which  had 
cost  Great  Britain  many  millions. 

Palmerston,  seconded  by  Layard,1  proclaimed  the 
regeneration,  political  and  financial,  of  the  Turkish 
Empire;  encouraged  British  investment  in  its  funds; 
identified  British  diplomacy  with  its  preservation ;  and 
drew  us  into  a  war  with  Russia  in  its  defence.  In  the 
letters  I  argued  on  the  opposite  side,  and  on  this  ques- 
tion at  least  few  will  say  that  my  pen  was  enlisted  on 
the  side  of  wrong. 

The  publication  of  the  letters  brought  me  into  con- 
nection with  Walker,2  the  editor  of  the  Daily  News,  one 
of  the  most  thoroughly  upright  and  conscientious  mem- 
bers of  the  Press  I  ever  knew.  What  is  behind  the 
Press  is  now  a  very  grave,  not  to  say  terrible,  question. 
If  such  men  as  Walker  were  behind  it,  we  should  be  safe 
enough. 

The  Letters  on  the  Empire,  with  general  connections, 
gave  me  for  the  time  something  of  a  political  position.  I 
was  offered  the  nomination  for  Chelsea  and  Kensington, 
a  constituency  in  which  the  Liberals  had  a  safe  major- 
ity. But  I  knew  the  difference  between  the  pen  and 
the  tongue.  I  never  was  a  speaker,  nor  had  I  strength 
for  Parliamentary  life.  Disraeli,  however,  seemed  to 
take  it  into  his  head  that  I  was  likely  to  be  trouble- 

f1  Sir  Austen  Henry  Layard,  excavator  of  Nineveh  ;  politician. 
1817-1894.] 

[2  Thomas  Walker ;  editor  of  the  Daily  News  from  1858  to  1869  ; 
then  editor  of  the  London  Gazette  till  1889.  Born  at  Oxford  in  1822 ; 
bred  a  carpenter ;  died  in  1898.] 


JOURNALISM  171 

some,  for  again  he  attacked  me  personally  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  This  time  it  was  for  writing  against  en- 
tails of  land,  a  subject  for  which  I  had  prepared  my- 
self under  the  guidance  of  an  eminent  land  agent.  He 
afterwards  pursued  me  across  the  Atlantic  and  tried  to 
brand  me,  under  a  perfectly  transparent  pseudonym,  if 
"Oxford  Professor  "  could  be  called  a  pseudonym  at  all, 
as  a  "social  sycophant."1  There  is  surely  nothing 
more  dastardly  than  this  mode  of  stabbing  a  reputation. 

[l  "The  Oxford  Professor,  who  was  the  guest  of  the  American 
Colonel,  was  quite  a  young  man,  of  advanced  opinions  on  all  subjects, 
religious,  social  and  political.  He  was  clever,  extremely  well-in- 
formed, so  far  as  books  can  make  a  man  knowing,  but  unable  to 
profit  even  by  that  limited  experience  of  life  from  a  restless  vanity 
and  overflowing  conceit,  which  prevented  him  from  ever  observing 
or  thinking  of  anything  but  himself.  He  was  gifted  with  a  great 
command  of  words,  which  took  the  form  of  endless  exposition,  va- 
ried by  sarcasm  and  passages  of  ornate  jargon.  He  was  the  last 
person  one  would  have  expected  to  recognise  in  an  Oxford  professor ; 
but  we  live  in  an  age  of  transition. 

"A  Parisian  man  of  science,  who  had  passed  his  life  in  alternately 
fighting  at  barricades  and  discovering  planets,  had  given  Colonel 
Campian,  who  had  lived  much  in  the  French  capital,  a  letter  of 
introduction  to  the  Professor,  whose  invectives  against  the  principles 
of  English  society  were  hailed  by  foreigners  as  representative  of  the 
sentiments  of  venerable  Oxford.  The  Professor,  who  was  not 
satisfied  with  his  home  career,  and,  like  many  men  of  his  order  of 
mind,  had  dreams  of  wild  vanity  which  the  New  World,  they  think, 
can  alone  realise,  was  very  glad  to  make  the  Colonel's  acquaintance, 
which  might  facilitate  his  future  movements.  So  he  had  lionised 
the  distinguished  visitors  during  the  last  few  days  over  the  Univer- 
sity ;  and  had  availed  himself  of  plenteous  opportunities  for  exhib- 
iting to  them  his  celebrated  powers  of  exposition,  his  talent  for  sar- 
casm, which  he  deemed  peerless,  and  several  highly  finished  pictur- 
esque passages,  which  were  introduced  with  extemporary  art. 

"The  Professor  was  much  surprised  when  he  saw  Lothair  enter 
the  saloon  at  the  hotel.  He  was  the  last  person  in  Oxford  whom  he 
expected  to  encounter.  Like  sedentary  men  of  extreme  opinions, 


172  REMINISCENCES 

Although  I  declined  to  run  for  Parliament  myself,  I 
went  with  some  of  my  friends  to  their  elections  and  en- 
joyed the  fun,  of  which  something  still  lingered,  though 
reform  had  quenched  the  glories  of  Eatanswill.  The 
Liberal  Whip  one  day  sent  for  me  and  told  me  that  Mr. 
Mundella,1  a  Nottingham  merchant,  had  been  asked  to 
run  for  Sheffield,  the  seat  of  the  most  militant  trade- 
unionism,  that  Mundella  was  a  novice  in  politics,  but 
would  be  inclined  to  accept,  if  I  would  go  with  him  and 
post  him.  The  Whigs  frowned  on  the  enterprise,  say- 
ing that  Roebuck2  ("Tear  'em"  was  his  nickname), 
the  other  candidate,  through  his  influence  with  the 
unions,  was  sure  of  success  and  would  come  back  with 
his  restive  Radicalism  a  greater  thorn  in  the  side  of 
the  Government  than  ever.  Besides,  there  was  danger 
of  a  riot.  I  suggested  a  reference  to  Gladstone.  The 
answer  was,  Fight.  To  Sheffield  we  went.  Mundella 
was  approached  by  the  most  extreme  and  formidable 
of  the  unions.  He  took  by  my  advice  a  boldly  in- 
dependent line,  which  was  successful,  the  great  Union 
no  doubt  having  its  enemies,  and  was  returned  by  a 
large  majority.  At  Abingdon  one  hall  was  stormed, 

he  was  a  social  parasite,  and  instead  of  indulging  in  his  usual  invec- 
tives against  peers  and  princes,  finding  himself  unexpectedly  about 
to  dine  with  one  of  that  class,  he  was  content  to  dazzle  and  amuse 
him."  Disraeli,  "Lothair,"  Chapter  xxiv.] 

I1  Anthony  John  Mundella,  M.P.  from  1868  till  his  death  in  1897 ; 
much  interested  in  Factory  Acts  and  Education  Acts,  etc.  Born 
in  1825.] 

[2  John  Arthur  Roebuck,  M.P.  1832-1837 ;  1841-1847 ;  1849- 
1868 ;  1874-1879.  Born  1801 ;  died  1879.] 


JOURNALISM  173 

and  at  Reading  we  had  a  row.  But  these  were  nothing 
to  the  election  days  of  old.  At  Woodstock  we  fought 
against  the  interest  of  Blenheim,  represented  by  Lord 
Randolph  Churchill *  of  curious  fame.  But  Blenheim 
had  given  its  Christmas  doles  and  prevailed. 

I1  Third  son  of  the  sixth  Duke  of  Marlborough.   1849-1894.] 


CHAPTER  XII 

CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN 

Peel — Disraeli  — ' '  Lothair  "  —  Bentinck — The  Duke  of  Newcastle 

—  Cardwell  —  "  Welbeck  "  —  Gladstone  —  The     Peelites  — 
Sidney  Herbert  —  Canning  —  Dalhousie  —  Sir  James  Graham 

—  Lord    Aberdeen  —  Russell  —  Granville  —  Godley  —  Joseph 
Chamberlain  —  Earl  Grey. 

PARTLY  by  my  connection  with  Journalism;  partly 
by  my  Eton  and  social  connections,  I  was  led  to  in- 
timacy with  some  public  men,  with  the  Peelite  circle  at 
first,  and  afterwards  with  Bright,  Cobden,  and  the  Man- 
chester School.  Peel x  himself  was  always  the  object 
of  my  political  allegiance.  I  saw  in  him  a  statesman,  in 
his  later  days  at  all  events,  above  party,  who  sought 
and  studied  with  singleness  of  heart  the  good  of  the 
whole  nation,  and  though  I  had  less  respect  for  some 
venerable  institutions  than  he  had,  I  recognized  his 
wisdom  in  preferring  administrative  reform,  which  he 
steadfastly  pursued,  to  organic  change.  Beyond  doubt 
he  had  the  confidence  not  only  of  the  majority,  but  of 
the  most  intelligent  and  respectable  part  of  the  nation. 
His  fall  before  an  unprincipled  coalition  of  Protection- 
ist Tories,  office-seeking  Whigs,  English  Radicals,  and 

[l  Sir  Robert  Peel,  second  Baronet ;  Prime  Minister  1834-1835 ; 
1841-1846.  Born  in  1788 ;  died  1850.] 

174 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  175 

Irish  enemies  of  the  Union  had  increased  my  feeling  in 
his  favour. 

Of  Peel  I  saw  nothing.  When  I  went  to  London  he 
had  fallen  from  office ;  not  from  power ;  he  was  still  at 
the  head  of  the  House  of  Commons  and  of  the  country. 
Greville  says  truly  that  he  would  have  been  elected 
Prime  Minister  by  an  overwhelming  majority.1  Soon 
afterwards  he  was  killed  by  a  fall  from  his  horse.  He 
was  a  good  shot,  but  a  bad  horseman,  having  a  loose 
seat.  Care  was  supposed  to  be  taken  in  buying  horses 
for  him  on  that  account.  But  the  horse  which  killed 
him  had  been  offered  for  sale  to  my  father  and  other  fox- 
hunters  in  our  neighbourhood,  and  had  been  rejected 
for  its  trick  of  bucking  and  kicking.  Our  neighbour  at 
Mortimer,  Sir  Paul  Hunter,2  met  Peel  riding  in  the  Park, 
recognized  his  horse,  actually  turned  to  warn  him ;  but 
fearing  to  intrude,  abstained.  The  horse  probably 
played  its  usual  trick;  threw  Peel  over  its  head;  and 
he,  falling  with  the  reins  in  his  hand,  pulled  down  the 
horse  upon  him.  The  horse  with  his  knee  broke  the 
rider's  rib,  drove  it  into  his  lungs,  and  thus,  like  the 
mole  whose  mole-hill  killed  William  III,  played  a  part 
in  history. 

It  was  currently  reported,  and  the  belief  has  found 
a  place  in  Froude's  Biography 3  of  Disraeli,  that  Peel 

I1  "Journal  of  the  Reign  of  Queen  Victoria."  By  Charles  C.  F. 
Greville.  London:  Longmans.  1885.  Vol.  Ill,  pages  100,  101.] 

[2  Sir  Claudius  Stephen  Paul  Hunter,  second  Baronet,  J.P., 
D.L.  1825-1890.] 

P  In  "The  Prime  Ministers  of  Queen  Victoria  "  Series,  edited  by 
Stuart  J.  Reid.] 


176  REMINISCENCES 

wanted  to  send  Disraeli  a  challenge  for  something  said 
by  him  in  the  Corn  Law  debates.  Peel  did  want  to  send 
a  challenge,  and  for  something  said  in  the  Corn  Law 
debates;  but  it  was  not  to  Disraeli;  it  was  to  Lord 
George  Bentinck.1  The  Duke  of  Newcastle,  who  was 
asked  by  Peel  to  carry  the  challenge,  told  me  the  story. 
We  were  talking  about  our  contemporaries  at  Eton  and 
Oxford.  This  led  to  mention  of  Sidney  Herbert  and 
a  reference  to  a  false  charge  against  Peel  of  having 
abused  Sidney  Herbert's  confidence  in  him.  The 
Duke  said  that  no  one  would  be  less  likely  to  be  guilty 
of  such  a  thing  than  Peel,  who  was  so  sensitive  about  his 
relation  to  his  friends  that,  for  aspersing  it,  he  had 
wanted  to  send  a  challenge  to  Lord  George  Bentinck. 
The  Duke  proceeded  to  say  that  after  the  debate,  when 
the  House  was  up,  Peel  had  asked  him  to  wait  while  he 
wrote  the  customary  letter  to  the  Queen,  then  took  his 
arm  and  walked  with  him  toward  his  own  house  in 
Hyde  Park  Gardens,  saying  by  the  way  that  Bentinck' s 
language  had  been  an  aspersion  on  his  honour  and  the 
Duke  must  carry  a  challenge.  The  Duke  remonstrated. 
Peel  insisted.  They  walked  to  and  fro  till  workmen 
began  to  pass  on  their  way  to  work.  Peel  was  then  per- 
suaded to  go  to  bed,  the  Duke  promising  speedily  to 
return.  Returning,  the  Duke  found  Peel  still  resolved 
to  send  the  challenge,  but  at  length  consideration  for 
what  the  Duke  pleaded  would  be  the  feelings  of  the 

[l  William  George  Frederic  Cavendish-Bentinck,  fifth  child  of  the 
fourth  Duke  of  Portland,  a  statesman  and  a  sportsman.     1802-1848.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  177 

Queen  in  case  of  serious  consequences  prevailed.  Hav- 
ing heard  the  story  I  naturally  asked  how  it  was  that 
Peel  felt  so  much  a  blow  of  Lord  George  Bentinck's 
bludgeon  when  he  showed  such  indifference  of  Disraeli's 
poniard,  of  which  he  once  only  stooped  to  take  cursory 
notice.  The  Duke's  answer  was  that,  calling  at  Peel's 
house  on  his  way  to  the  House  of  Commons,  he  had 
been  shown  by  Peel,  who  took  it  from  his  bag,  a  letter 
from  Disraeli  asking  place.  That  he  had  ever  asked 
Peel  for  place  Disraeli  in  the  House  of  Commons  de- 
nied. The  letter  which  proves  that  he  lied  is  now  pub- 
lished by  Mr.  Charles  Parker  l  and  most  abject  it  is. 
The  Duke  gave  me  the  fact  with  full  liberty  to  use  it. 
I  took  a  note  of  it  from  his  lips.  But  I  was  also  cog- 
nizant of  it  in  another  way,  Peel's  correspondence 
having  been  opened  to  me  by  his  literary  executors  for 
the  purpose  of  a  projected  Life.  My  inspection  of  the 
correspondence  was  confidential,  and  I  felt  bound  not 

I  to  embarrass  the  literary  executors,  especially  when  Peel 
had  himself  shown  so  much  delicacy  on  the  subject.  It  i 
is  not  unlikely  that  the  letter  was  before  him  in  Peel's 
bag  when  Disraeli's  falsehood  was  told.  Thus  the  fact 
remained  unknown  until,  after  a  long  delay  caused  by 
various  accidents,  Peel's  correspondence  saw  the  light. 
To  me,  however,  it  was  well  known  what  the  man  was 
who  was  making  his  gambling-table  of  my  country.  I 
do  not  feel  sure  that  I  did  right  in  keeping  the  secret. 

P  "Sir   Robert   Peel."     By   Charles   Stuart   Parker.     In   three 
volumes.    London :  Murray.    1891  and  1899.  Volume  II,  page  486.] 


178  REMINISCENCES 

Divulged  it  might  have  averted  mischief,  but  Peel 
had  kept  it. 

There  was  one  slip  in  the  Duke's  narrative.  He  said 
that  if  he  would  not  take  the  challenge  Peel  threatened 
to  apply  to  Lord  Hardinge.1  Hardinge  was  then  in 
India.  But  I  found  that  he  had  acted  for  Peel  in  an 
affair  with  a  Colonel  Mitchell,2  and  to  this  no  doubt  Peel 
referred.  There  was  always  fire  under  Peel's  snow,  and 
he  was  of  the  old  school  of  honour. 

Disraeli  had  in  reality  no  great  difficulties  to  over- 
come. He  was  a  Jew  by  descent,  but  a  baptized 
Christian.  He  was  married  to  a  rich  wife.  He  started 
in  public  life  as  an  adventurer,  angling  for  a  seat  in 
Parliament  by  baits  thrown  out  to  both  parties,  and 
going  through  a  series  of  transformations  in  the  course 
of  which  he  had  a  slanging  match  with  O'Connell,  who 
called  him  the  "  lineal  representative  of  the  impenitent 
thief."  In  his  "  Letters  of  Runnymede  "  he  fawns 
fulsomely  on  Peel  and  scurrilously  abuses  the  Whigs. 

One  part  of  his  Parliamentary  strategy  was  the  con- 
coction of  little  pointed  sayings  about  the  personal 
peculiarities  of  his  opponents;  as  when  he  said  of 
Horsman  3  that  he  was  a  "  superior  person,"  and  al- 
luded to  Hope's4  "Batavian  grace."  Lord  Salisbury B 

P  Charles  Stewart,  second  Viscount  Hardinge,  private  Secretary 
to  his  father,  Sir  Henry  Hardinge,  Governor-General  of  India, 
1844-1847;  M.P. ;  Under-Secretary  f or  War ;  etc.  1822-1894.] 

[2  Query.  —  John  Mitchell,  author  of  "The  Life  of  Wallenstein," 
."The  Fall  of  Napoleon,"  etc.  1785-1859.] 

[3  Edward  Horsman,  Whig  politician.     1807-1876.] 

[4  Alexander  James  Beresford-Hope.]          [5  The  third  Marquess.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  179 

was  a  "  master  of  gibes,  flouts,  and  jeers."  People  were 
weakly  afraid  of  drawing  these  shafts  of  ridicule  upon 
themselves.  When,  however,  Disraeli  tried  to  kill 
Gladstone  by  saying  that  he  was  a  "sophistical  rheto- 
rician intoxicated  with  the  exuberance  of  his  own  ver-  / 
bosity,"  the  ridicule  turned  on  himself. 

Disraeli's  strong  point  as  a  speaker  was  personal 

/"*  ' 
,  _r r j.     ^ 

heard  him  at  the  time  of  the  Mutiny  make  a  highly 
laboured  speech  on  the  Indian  question  which  evidently 
wearied  and  partly  cleared  the  House.  Even  as  a 
novelist  he  indulges  in  personal  attack,  though  when 
he  comes  to  deal  with  Lord  Hertford  his  own  syco- 
phancy betrays  itself  and  he  betrays  a  strong  contrast 
to  the  free  hand  of  Thackeray.  His  "Letters  of  Runny- 
mede  "  are  an  extravagant  imitation  of  Junius.  He 
says  to  Russell,  who  had  given  him  no  provocation, 

"  A  miniature  Mokanna,  you  are  now  exhaling  upon  the  consti- 
tution of  your  country,  which  you  once  eulogized,  and  its  great 
fortunes,  of  which  you  once  were  proud,  all  that  long-hoarded  venom 
and  all  those  distempered  humours  that  have  for  years  accumulated 
in  your  petty  heart,  and  tainted  the  current  of  your  mortified  life."  ' 

He  avowed  that  he  was  a  flatterer,  having,  as  he  said, 
found  the  practice  useful.  To  the  Queen  he  "laid  it  on 
with  a  trowel  "  and  with  most  satisfactory  effect.  He 
once  opened  a  sitting  of  the  Privy  Council  with  an  ex- 
travagant compliment  to  her  as  an  authoress.  He  was 
overheard  pandering  to  her  hatred  of  Garibaldi,  and 

P  Pages  59,  60.] 


180  REMINISCENCES 

when  she  said  that  she  had  been  told  the  same  thing 
before,  said,  "Then  it  must  be  true,  for  no  one  would 
tell  your  Majesty  anything,  but  the  truth." 

Peel  could  not  give  Disraeli  place,  but  his  reply  to 
him  was  perfectly  courteous,  and  it  seems  that  he  en- 
couraged him  at  his  rather  unfortunate  debut  in  the 
House  of  Commons  by  a  kindly  cheer.  Disraeli  pre- 
sently commenced  a  series  of  laboured  attacks  on  Peel. 
His  object  at  this  time  was  blackmailing,  for  he  pro- 
tested against  being  ruled  out  of  the  party,  and  after- 
wards asked  Graham,  Peel's  colleague,  for  patronage. 
The  split  between  Peel  and  the  Protectionists  opened  a 
grander  game.  That  he  had  lampooned  the  Corn  Law 
squires  in  "Popanilla"  l  did  not  prevent  his  flinging 
himself  into  their  arms  and  glutting  at  once  his  revenge 
and  his  ambition  by  a  series  of  most  intensely  venomous 
attacks  on  the  great  convert  to  free  trade.  He  was 
fortunate  in  the  split  between  Peel  and  his  Protection- 
ists. He  was  fortunate  in  finding  such  a  tool  as  Ben- 
tinck,  with  his  sporting  reputation,  his  stolidity  and 
violence,  wherewith  to  work  upon  the  angry  squires. 
He  was  fortunate  in  finding  a  patron  like  Lord  Derby, 
all-powerful  with  the  Tory  and  Protectionist  party,  and 
at  the  same  time  not  unjustly  nicknamed  "The  Jockey," 
with  a  good  deal  of  the  turfite  in  his  character,  and, 
though  supposed  to  be  a  paragon  of  high  principle,  not 
too  scrupulous  to  take  a  leap  in  the  dark  with  the  high- 

P  "The  Voyage  of  Captain  Popanilla."  By  the  Author  of 
"Vivian  Grey."  London.  1828.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  181 

est  interests  of  the  nation,  if  thereby  he  could  dish  the 
Whigs,  of  whom,  at  the  time  of  the  Reform  Bill,  he  had 
been  about  the  most  violent.  He  was  doubly  fortunate 
in  the  sudden  death  of  Bentinck,  who  was  ferociously 
sincere  and  would  never  have  consented  to  the  second 
part  of  his  friend's  game,  jettison  of  Protection.  He 
was  fortunate,  again,  in  having  on  the  throne,  no  longer 
Prince  Albert,  who  abhorred  him,  but  Prince  Albert's 
widow,  highly  receptive  of  the  flattery  which,  to  use 
what  was  reported  as  his  own  expression,  he  laid  on 
with  a  trowel.  His  cleverness  nobody  denies.  It  was 
shown  by  leading  the  gentlemen  of  England  out  of  the 
path  of  honour.  But  his  whole  course  was  one  of 
manoeuvring  with  a  selfish  aim.  Long  as  was  his 
career,  not  one  good  measure  of  importance  bears  his 
name.  Nor  in  his  speeches  is  there  anything  high  or 
noble,  anything  that  can  be  quoted  for  its  sentiment, 
anything  that  shows  genius  unless  it  be  the  genius  of 
the  literary  stabber.  His  elaborate  oration  on  India 
at  the  time  of  the  Mutiny,  which  I  heard,  was  very 
heavy,  and  thinned  the  House.  His  vindictiveness 
was  truly  oriental.  In  his  Life  of  Lord  George  Bentinck 
he  still  gloats  over  the  recollection  of  Peel  rising  "  con- 
fused and  suffering  "  from  his  attacks,  as  he  fancied, 
though  it  was  really  pain  at  the  rupture  of  the  tie  with 
party  and  friends  about  which  Peel's  feeling  was  in- 
tense. The  passage  *  is  interesting  read  in  comparison 

I1  Chapter  xv.  —  In  the  tenth  edition  of  Disraeli's  "Life,"  I  find 
the  passage  on  page  195.] 


182  REMINISCENCES 

with  Peel's  scrupulous  delicacy  in  respecting  the  con- 
fidential letter  suing  for  place. 

It  may  have  been  partly  by  suspicion  of  my  posses- 
sion of  an  unpleasant  secret  that  Disraeli  was  moved  to 
follow  me  across  the  Atlantic  and  try,  as  he  did  in 
"Lothair,"  *  to  brand  me  as  "a  social  sycophant." 
His  knowledge  of  my  social  character  was  not  great, 
for  I  had  only  once  met  him  in  society.  His  allusion  to 
the  "Oxford  Professor"  who  was  going  to  the  United 
States  was  as  transparent  as  if  he  had  used  my  name. 
Had  I  been  in  England,  where  my  character  was 
known,  I  should  have  let  the  attack  pass;  but  I 
was  in  a  strange  country  where,  made  by  a  man  of 
note,  the  attack  was  likely  to  tell.  I  therefore  gave 
Disraeli  the  lie 2  and  neither  he  nor  any  of  his  organs 
ever  ventured  to  repeat  the  calumny.  Surely  nothing 
can  be  more  dastardly  than  an  attack  on  character 
under  cover  of  a  pseudonym.  However  false  and  ma- 
licious the  slander  may  be,  the  person  attacked  can- 
not repel  it  without  seeming  to  recognize  its  aptitude. 

In  "Popanilla"  will  be  found  clear  proof  that  Dis- 
raeli was  not  a  Protectionist,  but  a  satirist  of  Pro- 

[l  See  note  on  page  171,  chap,  xi.] 

[2  In  the  following  letter :  — 

"In  your  'Lothair'  you  introduce  an  Oxford  Professor  who  is 
about  to  emigrate  to  America,  and  you  describe  him  as  a  social  parasite. 
You  well  know  that  if  you  had  ventured  openly  to  accuse  me  of  any 
social  baseness  you  would  have  had  to  answer  for  your  words ; 
but  when  sheltering  yourself  under  the  literary  forms  of  a  work 
of  fiction,  you  seek  to  traduce  with  impunity  the  social  character 
of  a  political  opponent,  your  expressions  can  touch  no  man's  hono 
—  they  are  the  stingless  insults  of  a  coward."] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  183 

tection.  He  took  to  Protection  for  the  purpose  of  his 
conspiracy  against  Peel  with  the  intention  of  throwing 
it  over,  as  he  did,  when  his  object  had  been  gained. 
This  programme  he  could  not  have  carried  out  if  Lord 
George  Bentinck  had  lived,  insead  of  being  removed, 
as  he  was,  just  at  the  right  moment,  by  a  sudden  death. 
Bentinck  was  an  honest  fanatic,  and  would  never  have 
allowed  Disraeli  to  turn  him  round  for  the  purpose  of 
the  game.  In  Bentinck,  who  had  the  character  and 
confidence  of  the  land-owning  gentry,  which  Disraeli 
lacked,  was  found  the  exact  tool  required  by  Disraeli. 
The  charge  against  Peel  of  having  " murdered"  Can- 
ning, which  Disraeli  in  his  Life  of  Bentinck  has  carefully 
credited  to  his  "  friend,"  was  Disraeli's  own  invention 
and  infused  by  him  into  his  dupe.  Bentinck  had  been 
Canning's  private  Secretary.  It  was  not  likely  that  he 
would  have  followed  Peel  all  those  years  if  he  had  be- 
lieved him  to  be  the  betrayer  of  Canning,  and  had  he 
been  himself  devoted  to  Canning,  as  Disraeli  pretends, 
though  Greville  scouts  the  idea.1 

At  the  time  when  Peel  declared  for  free  trade  dire 
distress  prevailed.  Tens  of  thousands  of  working-men 
were  out  of  employment.  Grass  was  being  boiled  for 
food.  Wedding-rings  were  being  pawned  by  the  hun- 
dred. In  Ireland  a  terrible  famine  impended.  Yet 
this  Semite,  who  had  shown  that  he  saw  and  ridiculed 
the  fallacy  of  Protection,  as  he  continued,  when  Pro- 
tectionism had  served  his  turn,  to  do,  could  for  his  own 

f1  "Memoirs,"  second  part,  Volume  II,  pages  398  et  seq.] 


Oi 

— 
O 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  185 

revenge  and  advancement  coolly  play  the  Protection- 
ist game. 

The  Conservatives  who  had  stuck  to  Peel  through 
the  Corn  Law  conflict,  and  though  few  in  number  were 
the  brains  of  the  party,  included  Graham,1  Lord 
Aberdeen,2  Gladstone,  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,3  Dal- 
housie,4  Cardwell,5  Sidney  Herbert,  and  Canning.  Hav- 
ing hovered  for  a  time  between  the  two  camps,  they  ul- 
timately coalesced,  and  finally  fused,  with  the  Liberals. 
The  six  younger  members  of  the  group  had  been 
not  only  taken  into  office,  but  personally  trained  by 
Peel,  who  was  master  of  all  departments  and  was 
unique  in  devices  to  provide  the  country  with  a  succes- 
sion of  statesmen. 

My  chief  political  friends  of  the  group  were  the  Duke 
of  Newcastle  and  Edward  Cardwell.  The  Duke  had 
been,  like  me,  though  somewhat  before  me,  in  Cole- 
ridge's house  at  Eton,  which  I  have  said  was  a  bond. 

The  Duke  of  Newcastle  was  not  a  great  statesman, 
perhaps  he  was  not  even  a  very  great  administrator, 
for  though  he  was  a  good  man  of  business  and  devoted 
to  work,  he  wore  himself  out  with  details  which  he 

P  Sir  James  Robert  George  Graham.     1792-1861.] 

P  George  Hamilton  Gordon,  fourth  Earl  of  Aberdeen,  Secretary 
for  War  and  the  Colonies  under  Peel.  1784^-1860.] 

[3  The  fifth  Duke.] 

[*  James  Andrew  Brown  Ramsay,  tenth  Earl  and  first  Marquess 
of  Dalhousie,  President  of  the  Board  of  Trade ;  afterwards  Governor- 
General  of  India.  1812-1860.] 

[5  Edward,  Viscount  Cardwell ;  held  many  high  political  posts 
under  Peel  and  Aberdeen,  Palmerston,  Russell,  and  Gladstone. 
1813-1886.] 


186  REMINISCENCES 

ought  to  have  left  to  subordinates ;  and  I  fancy  he  had 
not  the  gift  of  choosing  his  subordinates  very  well. 
The  breakdown  in  the  Crimea,  however,  was  not  his 
fault,  but  the  fault  of  a  long-disused  and  rusty  machine 
which  he  was  just  getting  into  order  when  the  Govern- 
ment fell.  Though  a  man  of  strong  feelings  and  affec- 
tions, he  lacked  imagination,  and  perhaps  owed  partly 
to  that  defect  the  unhappiness  which  befell  him  in  his 
married  life.  But  he  was  a  thoroughly  upright,  high- 
minded,  and  patriotic  gentleman,  who  kept  his  soul 
above  his  rank,  and  devoted  himself  to  the  service  of 
the  State;  while  the  fortitude  with  which  he  bore 
accumulated  misfortune  and  torturing  disease  would 
have  touched  any  heart,  as  it  did  mine.  He  showed,  as 
I  have  said,  remarkable  tact  and  temper  in  presiding 
over  the  Education  Commission,  which  was  made  up  of 
men  chosen  as  representatives  of  different  opinions  on 
a  burning  question.  In  that  respect,  at  all  events,  he 
would  not  have  been  a  bad  head  of  a  government.  His 
colleagues  would  also  have  felt  that  they  could  thor- 
oughly trust  his  honour.  It  was  in  an  unlucky  hour,  and 
at  the  bidding  of  an  ill-starred  ambition,  that  he  for- 
sook the  Colonial  Office  for  the  Ministry  of  War.  As  a 
Colonial  Minister  he  was  successful  in  his  own  way, 
which  was  that  of  a  decided  Imperialist,  though  he  was 
too  good-natured  ever  to  quarrel  with  a  friend  who 
wrote  in  support  of  the  opposite  view.  I  turned  up 
the  other  day  one  of  his  notes  bidding  me  come  to 
dinner  and  he  would  have  one  or  two  Colonists  to 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  187 

"roast"  me.  His  greatest  mistake,  perhaps,  was  his 
alliance  with  Sadleir  l  and  that  gang.  But  into  this  he 
was  led  by  a  sincere  desire  of  a  liberal  government  for 
Ireland.  His  liberal  tendencies  did  not  fail  to  bring 
upon  him  the  wrath  of  his  father,  who  had  greatly 
encumbered  the  estate  by  reckless  purchases  of  terri- 
torial influence  for  the  purpose  of  upholding  ultra- 
Toryism,  and  had  prepared  for  himself  a  place  among 
the  most  hapless  victims  of  the  irony  of  fate  by  opening 
the  door  of  the  House  of  Commons  to  Mr.  Gladstone. 

Card  well,  whose  acquaintance  I  made  at  first  through 
the  Duke,  always  seemed  to  me  the  model  of  a  public 
servant.  He  was  the  most  typical  pupil,  as  well  as 
one  of  the  warmest  adherents  of  Peel,  who,  as  I  have 
said,  did  his  best  to  train  statesmen  for  the  country, 
and  exacted,  as  the  title  to  promotion,  the  conscien- 
tious industry  and  thorough  devotion  to  the  public 
service  of  which  he  was  himself  a  grand  example. 
Cardwell,  like  Peel,  was  dry,  and,  like  Peel,  somewhat 
stiff  and  formal ;  there  was  nothing  about  him  brilliant 
or  impressive  to  anyone  who  was  not  impressed  by  duty. 
He  was  not  and  never  could  have  been  a  party  leader ; 
he  had  not  the  fire,  the  magnetism,  the  eloquence,  or 
the  skill  as  a  tactician.  It  did  not  seem  to  me  that  he 
ever  scanned  the  political  field  for  strategical  purposes 
as  party  leaders  do.  He  was  content  to  do  the  business 
and  solve  the  question  of  the  hour.  The  question  of 

f1  John  Sadleir,  the  ."Irish  politician  and  swindler."  1814- 
1856.] 


188  REMINISCENCES 

the  hour  he  solved  by  an  honest  sort  of  opportunism, 
rather  than  on  any  very  broad  principle,  or  with  refer- 
ence to  any  far-reaching  policy.  Not  only  was  he 
unqualified  to  be  a  party  leader,  but  he  was  an  indiffer- 
ent partisan;  his  mind  was  too  fair,  and  his  judgment 
was  too  cool.  On  the  other  hand,  he  was  a  true  com- 
rade, a  fast  friend,  and  not  a  bad  hater  of  the  enemies  of 
his  friends.  I  believe  that  this  is  the  right  way  of  stat- 
ing the  case,  and  that  Cardwell  was  free  from  rancour. 
I  know  that  some  whose  opinion  is  of  weight  thought 
him  unjust  to  opponents.  It  is  difficult  for  a  gladiator 
in  such  an  arena  as  party  politics  to  be  perfectly  just; 
but  I  must  say  that  I  never  heard  Cardwell  speak  bit- 
terly of  mere  difference  of  opinion,  or  of  anything  but 
what  he  sincerely  believed  to  be  dishonest.  He  was 
cautious,  perhaps  reticent,  to  a  fault.  Without  being 
eloquent,  he  was  a  good  and  convincing  speaker  in 
Peel's  manner,  and  particularly  clear  in  exposition; 
yet  he  never  spoke  if  he  could  help  it,  and  more  than 
once  rehearsed  to  me,  in  substance,  speeches  which  he 
was  going  to  make,  but  when  the  time  came  did  not 
make.  It  was  as  an  administrator  and  practical  legis- 
lator that  he  was  really  great.  While  others  talked 
and  manoeuvred  for  power,  he  did  an  immense  amount 
of  work,  and  of  the  best  quality,  for  the  nation.  His 
great  achievements  and  monuments  are  the  Merchant 
Shipping  Act  of  1854, l  which  is  still  the  code  of  our 
Mercantile  Marine,  and  the  transformation  of  the  army 
p  17  and  18  Viet.  Cap.  cxx.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  189 

from  an  unprofessional  and  unscientific  to  a  profes- 
sional and  scientific  force,  which  he  accomplished  with 
Lord  Wolseley's  aid.  Peel  made  it  a  point  of  honour 
so  carefully  to  prepare  his  Bills  that  they  should  pass 
with  little  amendment,  and  in  this,  as  in  other  respects, 
Cardwell  was  a  faithful  pupil.  The  Merchant  Shipping 
Bill  with  its  five  hundred  and  forty-eight  sections  passed  v 
through  Committee  at^single^sitting  —  curious  con-  , 
trast  to  a  Franchise  Act,  the  work  of  the  opposite  school, 
which,  when  it  finally  became  law,  retained  of  the 
original  Bill  scarcely  anything  but  the  preamble.1 
The  transformation  of  the  army  in  face  of  all  the 
prejudices  and  opposition  of  the  men  of  the  old  school 
was  probably  as  heavy  a  piece  of  work  as  ever  fell  to  the 
lot  of  a  British  legislator.  It  broke  Cardwell  down,  and 
brought  on  the  malady  which  closed  his  working  days. 
The  strongest  testimony  is  borne,  by  those  who  are  best 
qualified  to  judge,  to  the  temper  and  patience  as  well  as 
to  the  ability  and  the  power  of  mastering  details  dis- 
played in  the  conduct  of  the  business.  Testimony 
equally  strong  is  borne  to  the  display  of  the  same 
qualities  in  other  departments,  notably  in  the  Board  of 
Trade.  As  Colonial  Secretary  Cardwell  had  to  deal, 
amidst  a  tornado  of  public  excitement,  with  the  ques- 
tion of  the  disturbances  in  Jamaica  and  of  Governor 
Eyre.2  The  case  of  Jamaica  he  was  generally  allowed 
to  have  settled  well,  though  in  the  case  of  Governor 

t1  No  doubt  a  reference  to  Disraeli's  Reform  Bill,  which  became 
law  in  August,  1867.]  [»  See  Chapter  XX.] 


190  REMINISCENCES 

Eyre  it  was  impossible  to  unite  the  suffrages  of  those 
who  regarded  the  Governor  as  a  hero  with  the  suffrages 
of  those  who  regarded  him  not  only  as  the  hateful  in- 
strument of  a  cruel  panic,  but  as  the  dastardly  murderer 
of  his  personal  enemy,  Gordon.  To  Cardwell  is  due,  if 
not  the  initiative,  the  execution,  of  a  great  change  in 
Colonial  policy;  for  he  it  was  who,  by  practically  in- 
sisting that  the  Colonies  should  pay  for  troops  main- 
tained in  them,  inaugurated  self-defence,  which  was  a 
long  step  towards  Colonial  independence.  Cardwell 
was  no  eye-server;  he  did  the  work  of  his  office  thor- 
oughly and  faithfully  without  any  thought  of  self-dis- 
play or  of  the  figure  which  he  was  to  make  before  the 
House  of  Commons;  and  one  could  not  help  thinking 
how  absurd  was  the  party  system  which  compelled  the 
country  to  deprive  itself  of  such  a  departmental  ad- 
ministrator because  the  party  to  which  he  belonged 
had  been  defeated  on  some  legislative  question  totally 
unconnected  with  the  business  of  his  department. 
Albeit,  as  has  already  been  said,  no  party  leader  or 
organizer  of  political  forces,  Cardwell  in  council,  though 
quiet,  was  strong,  and  was  able  even  to  control  the 
course  of  errant  and  flaming  bodies  which  afterwards 
set  the  political  firmament  on  fire.  Such  at  least  was 
the  impression  which  I  formed  when  I  was  living  in 
the  Peelite  circle.  Though  everywhere  but  in  his  home 
Cardwell  seemed  rather  cold,  his  wife  could  not  live 
when  he  was  gone.  Her  remaining  days,  in  fact,  were 
almost  spent  in  lingering  round  his  grave. 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  191 

With  Newcastle  and  Cardwell  I  was  very  intimate, 
passing  much  time  and  meeting  interesting  people  in 
the  houses  of  both  of  them.  Clumber,  the  Duke's 
abode,  was  in  itself  full  of  interest  as  a  great  historic 
house  still  full  of  historic  treasures,  gifts,  some  of  them 
gifts  of  Royalty,  to  statesmen  of  old.  Among  these  was 
a  superb  pair  of  Sevres  vases,  the  gift  of  the  King  of 
France.  They  had  been  lent  to  an  exhibition  where  one 
of  them  was  swept  in  a  roll  of  cotton  off  a  packing  table 
and  smashed  to  pieces,  but  had  been  very  skilfully  put 
together  again.  The  Duke  was  trying  to  redeem  the 
estate  encumbered  by  the  extravagance  of  his  predeces- 
sors, one  of  whom  had  indulged  his  pride  by  buying  and 
tearing  down  a  vast  and  sumptuous  mansion  in  the 
neighbourhood  that  Clumber  might  have  no  rival. 
But  saving  must  have  been  difficult  when  such  a  house- 
hold as  I  saw  in  the  domestic  Chapel  at  Clumber  was 
to  be  maintained.  These  households  must  have  eaten 
deeply  into  the  revenues  of  the  landed  aristocracy  of 
England. 

The  present  King,1  then  Prince  of  Wales,  was  at 
Clumber.  In  his  honour  a  banquet  was  given  in  the 
state  dining-room,  with  the  ancestral  dessert  service  of 
gold  plate,  which  did  not  seem  to  me  very  dazzling  in  its 
brilliancy.  The  Mayors  of  neighbouring  towns  were 
invited.  Ice  to  cool  wine  had  just  come  into  fashion. 
One  of  the  Mayors  took  it  for  an  entree,  got  it  on  his 
plate,  first  tried  to  cut  it,  then  carried  a  lump  of  it  to  his 
t1  This  refers,  of  course,  to  his  late  Majesty  King  Edward  VII.] 


192  REMINISCENCES 

mouth  with  a  spoon.  A  well-trained  footman,  seeing 
the  situation,  whipped  away  the  ice,  but  the  Mayor's 
confidence  was  shaken  for  the  rest  of  the  feast. 

A  strange  claim  raised  to  the  Portland  inheritance 
reminded  me  of  a  visit  I  paid  to  Welbeck  in  company 
with  Denison,  afterwards  Lord  Ossington,1  when  we 
were  together  staying  at  Clumber.  Denison  was  the 
brother-in-law  of  the  Duke  of  Portland.2  When  we 
approached  Welbeck  he  said,  "I  can't  take  you  in;  I 
can't  go  in  myself,  though  I  am  the  Duke's  brother-in- 
law.  He  is  hypochondriac,  lives  underground,  goes 
underground  to  the  railroad,  and  will  let  nobody  see 
him.  But  we  can  look  round  the  place."  The  first 
things  I  saw  were  some  pines  which  had  been  trans- 
planted at  their  full  growth  with  a  screen  of  proportion- 
ate height  to  protect  them  from  the  wind.  The  next 
thing  was  a  newly-built  set  of  stables,  coach-houses,  and 
other  offices  on  the  very  grandest  scale,  with  carriages 
and  horses  to  match,  all  to  keep  up  the  state  of  a  gran- 
dee who  never  showed  his  face  out  of  doors.  It  is 
surely  most  unlikely  that  a  man  so  full  of  aristocratic 
pride,  even  if  his  sanity  was  impaired,  should  have 
chosen  to  masquerade  as  a  London  tradesman.  We 
rode  home  by  moonlight  through  a  grove  of  spruces, 
feathering  to  the  ground,  which  I  thought  the  most 
solemn  things  in  the  way  of  trees  I  had  ever  seen.  I 

f1  See  page  149,  Chapter  X.  He  married  Charlotte,  seventh 
child  of  the  fourth  Duke  of  Portland.  1800-1873.] 

[2  William  John  Cavendish  Scott  Bentinck,  the  fifth  Duke  of 
Portland.  Born,  1800 ;  died  in  1879.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  193 

have  since  seen  the  rival  of  that  grove,  perhaps  its  su- 
perior, in  the  road  through  the  forest  from  Vancouver 
to  New  Westminster. 

My  memories  of  Gladstone,  with  whom  I  was  also 
very  intimate,  I  have  given  elsewhere.1  I  will  not 
dwell  again  on  his  almost  miraculous  powers  of  work 
and  speech,  on  his  mastery  of  the  art  of  framing  great 
measures  and  carrying  them  through  Parliament,  on 
his  triumphs  as  a  financier,  his  general  though  less  un- 
chequered  merits  as  a  statesman,  his  virtues,  graces  of 
character,  and  piety  as  a  man.  Nor  need  I  touch  again 
his  weaker  points;  his  liability  to  self-deception  and 
casuistry,  or  the  violent  impulsiveness  and  combative- 
ness  which  hurried  him  at  last  into  his  Irish  policy  and 
made  his  great  friend  and  admirer  Lord  Selborne  de- 
scribe him  in  a  letter  to  me  as  "  morally  insane."  Even 
in  his  intellect  there  was  a  strange  mixture  of  weakness 
with  strength.  It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  the  same 
man  can  have  made  the  budget-speeches  .and  written, 
as  Gladstone  in  the  full  light  of  research  and  science 
wrote,  about  theology  and  Homer.  His  fancy,  heated 
with  the  political  fray,  grew  wild  enough  to  compare 
the  abolition  of  the  exclusionist  Parliament  of  Ireland 
to  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew.  In  the  earlier 
part  of  his  career,  Gladstone  I  suspect  was  uncon- 
sciously controlled  by  the  gentle  influence  of  friends 
such  as  Cardwell  and  Newcastle,  both  of  whom  he  lost. 

P  "My  Memory  of  Gladstone."  Toronto:  Wm.  Tyrrell; 
London :  T.  Fisher  Unwin.  1904.  Second  edition,  1909.] 


194  REMINISCENCES 

Of  Mr.  Morley's  1  Life,  the  first  two  volumes  are  his- 
torical as  well  as  admirably  written;  this  can  hardly 
be  said  of  the  last.  It  does  credit  to  Peel's  largeness 
of  mind  that  he  should  have  recognized  and  promoted 
high  ability  in  a  character  so  different  from  his  own. 
Gladstone  was  loyal  to  Peel,  but  I  do  not  think  he  ever 
loved  him.  Peel  was  an  orthodox  Protestant  and 
Erastian,  while  Gladstone  was  a  High  Churchman,  with 
Ritualists  for  his  special  friends,  and  hankering  for  re- 
union with  Rome.  After  Peel's  death,  and  when  Pro- 
tection, as  Disraeli  said,  was  "dead  and  damned,"  Glad- 
stone would  have  taken  the  Conservative  leadership,  if 
Disraeli  had  not  stood  in  the  way.  Disraeli  professed 
his  willingness  to  go,  but  did  not  go. 

That  for  which  I  could  never  cease  to  be  grateful 
to  Gladstone  was  his  noble  advocacy  of  the  cause  of  the 
oppressed ;  of  the  cause  of  the  Italians  by  Austria  and 
the  Bourbons ;  of  the  cause  of  the  Christians  oppressed 
by  the  Turks.  Here  at  all  events  he  was  perfectly 
single-hearted  and  sincere.  His  sympathy  was  with 
everybody  who  was  struggling  to  be  free.  This  it  was 
mainly,  I  believe,  which  led  him  in  the  American  War  of 
Secession  to  lean  to  the  side  of  the  South,  and  in  a  not 
very  happy  moment  to  proclaim  that  Jefferson  Davis 
had  made  the  South  a  nation.  His  course  gave  offence 
to  strong  Liberals.  It  was  probably  with  a  view  to  re- 
gaining their  good  opinion  that  he  wrote  one  of  them  a 

[l  Now  Viscount  Morley  of  Blackburn.  His  Life  of  Gladstone 
was  published  by  Messrs.  Macmillan  in  1903.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  195 

letter  saying  that  if  the  South  were  separated  from  the 
North  he  would  willingly  see  Canada  annexed  to  the 
North.  The  avowal  would  not  have  satisfied  those 
who  desired  the  extinction  of  the  slave-power ;  while  it 
might  have  embarrassed  the  writer  if  he  had  ever  been 
called  upon  again  as  Minister  to  deal  with  Colonial  ,'( 
questions.  It  was  therefore  destroyed. 

It  may  safely  be  said  that  it  was  not  without  serious 
misgiving  that  Gladstone  went  into  the  Crimean  War. 
This  probably  was  the  real  source  of  his  secession  from 
Palmerston's  Government.  It  happened  that  when  he 
was  meditating  that  step  I  was  with  him  one  morning 
on  business.  Our  business  done,  he  went  on  to  talk 
to  me,  or  to  himself,  about  the  war  in  a  way  that  be- 
trayed his  intention.  He  said  that  Russia  had  offered 
us  the  terms  originally  demanded,  and  that  if  the  Tro- 
jans would  have  given  back  Helen  and  her  possessions, 
the  Greeks  would  have  raised  the  siege  of  Troy.  It  did 
not  occur  to  him  that  the  terms  originally  demanded 
might  not  satisfy  after  the  expenditure  of  so  much 
blood,  or  that  when  he  had  roused  the  pugnacity  of  the 
bull-dog  it  might  be  difficult  to  call  him  off. 

I  can  hardly  attempt  here  fully  to  discuss  his  charac- 
ter, his  public  character,  of  course,  I  mean;  for  his 
private  character,  it  need  not  be  said,  was  admirable  in 
every  way.  Labouchere  said  that  he  did  not  object  to 
Gladstone's  having  aces  up  his  sleeve,  but  he  did  object 
to  his  thinking  that  the  Almighty  had  put  them  there. 
Jowett,  who  always  withheld  his  confidence,  said  some- 


196  REMINISCENCES 

thing  much  more  severe.1  Simplicity  certainly  was  not 
Gladstone's  ordinary  characteristic,  nor  could  it  be 
denied  that  he  had  a  singular  power  of  self-deception. 
It  was  the  general  impression  that  he  would  have  taken 
the  Conservative  leadership  if  Disraeli  had  been  out  of 
the  way.  Having  become  the  Liberal  Leader,  he  threw 
himself  into  his  part  with  all  the  impetuosity  of  his 
nature ;  persuading  himself,  perhaps,  that  he  had  long 
been  a  Liberal  as  he  persuaded  himself  that  he  had  long 
been  inclined  to  Home  Rule.  It  cannot  be  denied  that 
his  great  Liberal  moves,  Disestablishment  and  Home 
Rule,  coincided,  though  he  might  not  be  conscious  of 
the  coincidence,  with  the  exigencies  of  his  struggle  for 
power.  It  has  now  been  pretty  well  proved  that  his 
sudden  dissolution  of  Parliament  in  1874  without  con- 
sulting his  colleagues,  which  appeared  so  unaccount- 
able, and  for  a  time  wrecked  his  party,  was  his  mode  of 
escape  from  a  personal  dilemma  in  which  he  had  in- 
volved himself  by  taking  the  salaried  office  of  Chancel- 
lor of  the  Exchequer  without  going  to  his  constituents 
for  re-election.  I  was  at  Manchester  when  the  disso- 
lution was  announced,  and  I  remember  the  astonish- 
ment and  consternation  which  it  caused. 

Archbishop  Tait  told  me  that  what  he  most  feared  in 
Gladstone  was  his  levity.  This  may  seem  paradoxical ; 
yet  I  believe  the  Archbishop  was  right.  That  Glad- 

f1  See  "The  Life  and  Letters  of  Benjamin  Jowett,  M.A.  Master 
of  Balliol  College,  Oxford."  By  Evelyn  Abbott,  M.A.,  LL.D.,  and 
Lewis  Campbell,  M.A.,  LL.D.  2  vols.  London:  Murray.  1897. 
Volume  I,  page  406.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  197 

stone's  moral  aspirations  were  high  cannot  be  doubted. 
It  is  more  doubtful  whether  his  sense  of  responsibility 
was  very  strong.  At  a  dinner  party  at  which  I  was 
present  he  came  up  late  from  the  House.  He  was  in  the 
best  of  spirits  and  seemed  to  have  nothing  on  his  mind. 
At  last  he  spoke  of  the  motion  of  which  he  had  just 
given  notice  in  the  House.  The  motion,  as  afterwards 
appeared,  was  one  which  would  have  brought  the  two 
Houses  into  collision  with  each  other,  and  the  notice 
of  which  had  been  given  amidst  extreme  excitement. 
When  his  love  of  power  and  his  pugnacity  were  ex- 
cited, it  is  questionable  whether  he  thought  much  of 
anything  but  victory.  Perhaps  there  is  a  certain 
similarity  between  the  cases  of  a  political  leader  and  a 
stormy  element  which  would  make  extreme  sensitive- 
ness a  drawback. 

That  Gladstone  was  a  statesman  of  the  very  highest 
class  I  should  find  it  difficult  to  believe.  His  moves 
always  seemed  to  be  impulses  rather  than  parts  of  a 
settled  plan.  In  his  speeches  on  the  extension  of  the 
franchise  he  failed  to  indicate  the  polity  which  he  ex- 
pected to  produce,  and  talked  fallacious  commonplace 
about  uniting  the  whole  people  about  their  ancient 
throne.  If  he  attacked  the  Lords,  it  was  not  that  he 
had  deliberately  made  up  his  mind  in  favour  of  a  change, 
but  that  they  came  in  his  way  at  the  moment ;  and  the 
constitutional  doctrines  which  he  put  forward  on  that 
occasion  were  the  angry  fabrication  of  the  hour.  His 
proposal  to  give  Ireland  a  Parliament  of  her  own  and  at 


198  REMINISCENCES 

the  same  time  a  representation  in  the  United  Parlia- 
ment which  would  have  enabled  her  to  hold  the  balance 
of  parties  and  practically  to  dominate  there,  can  hardly 
be  mentioned  with  calmness.  His  lifelong  friend  and 
supporter,  Lord  Selborne,  said  in  a  letter  to  me  that 
Gladstone  was  "  morally  insane." 

As  a  speaker  he  was  in  the  highest  degree  effective, 
but  the  effect  was  produced  by  his  command  of  the 
subject,  by  the  ascendancy  of  his  character,  by  the  im- 
pressiveness  of  his  manner  and  an  admirable  voice, 
rather  than  by  any  grace  or  force  of  language.  He 
was  at  his  best,  I  think,  in  expounding  a  great  measure 
and  steering  it  through  the  House.  He  had,  as  was 
said  before,  marred  the  freshness  of  his  style  by  over- 
much speaking  in  debating-clubs  early  in  life.  His 
prolixity,  which  Disraeli  called  his  verbosity,  was  not 
felt  by  the  hearers  of  his  speeches,  who  were  rather 
struck  by  his  command  of  perfectly  correct  language, 
but  it  is  greatly  felt  by  his  readers. 

"We  are  much  better  off  than  you  are  for  a  leader  " 
said  a  Conservative  Member  of  Parliament  to  a  Liberal ; 
"ours  is  only  an  unprincipled  scoundrel,  yours  is  a 
dangerous  lunatic."  Tories  were  always  saying,  and 
half  believed,  that  Gladstone  was  literally  insane,  and 
stories  of  his  insanity  were  current.  One  was  that 
he  had  gone  to  a  toyshop  and  ordered  its  whole 
contents  to  be  sent  to  his  house.  I  asked  Lady 
Russell  whether  there  could  be  any  foundation  for 
this  report.  Her  answer  was,  "I  begin  to  think 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  199 

there  must  be,  for  I  have  heard  it  now  every  session 
for  several  years." 

If  Gladstone  had  not,  like  Brougham,  the  vanity  of 
versatility,  he  had  the  propensity  in  large  measure.  It 
is  true  that  his  amazing  powers  of  acquisition  enabled 
him  in  a  way  to  deal  with  many  subjects.  But  his 
writings,  enormously  voluminous  and  various,  are  of 
little  value.  His  controversy  with  Huxley  about  Gen- 
esis displayed  his  weakness.  His  argument,  in  effect, 
was  that  the  Creator,  though  unscientific,  had  come  re- 
markably near  the  truth  about  his  own  work  and  had  all 
but  hit  upon  the  Nebular  Hypothesis.  In  his  Homeric 
and  mythological  lucubrations  there  are  some  things 
that  are  interesting,  but  there  are  others  so  fantastic 
that  their  publication  shakes  one's  confidence  in  the 
general  wisdom  of  the  man.  He  once  propounded  to 
me  a  Homeric  theory  which  he  was  going  to  give  to  the 
world  founded  on  a  philological  discovery  which  he  sup- 
posed himself  to  have  made.  I  felt  sure  that  the  dis- 
covery was  an  illusion,  and  tried  to  convince  him  of  this, 
without  effect.  Just  then  his  brother-in-law,  Lord 
Lyttleton,1  who  was  a  first-rate  classical  scholar,  came 
into  the  room.  He  evidently  saw  the  matter  as  I  did, 
yet  he  allowed  himself  to  be  half  talked-over,  and  I  sup- 
pose the  fancy  went  into  print.  Before  the  publication, 
Gladstone  gave  a  Homeric  dinner  to  half  a  dozen  schol- 
ars, including  Milman  and  Cornewall  Lewis.  The  osten- 
sible object  of  our  meeting  was  to  discuss  Gladstone's 

P  The  fourth  Baron.] 


200  REMINISCENCES 

theories.  But  of  discussion  there  was  very  little.  I 
suspect  it  was  not  easy  for  adverse  truths  to  find  access  to 
the  Great  Man.  It  was  very  difficult  to  convince  him  by 
argument ;  but  I  suspect  he  was  more  open  to  infusion. 

There  was  nothing  fine  or  indicative  of  high  intellect 
in  the  face  except  the  fire  of  the  eye.  The  whole  frame 
bespoke  nervous  energy.  Gladstone  was  a  first-rate 
sleeper.  At  the  time  when  he  was  being  fiercely  at- 
tacked for  his  secession  from  Palmerston's  Government, 
I  was  told  by  a  common  friend  whom  I  met  one  evening 
that  he  was  in  a  state  of  extreme  excitement.  I  hap- 
pened next  morning  to  have  business  with  him.  He 
went  out  of  the  room  to  fetch  a  letter,  leaving  me  with 
Mrs.  Gladstone,  to  whom  I  made  some  remark  on  the 
trying  nature  of  his  situation.  She  answered  that  her 
husband  came  home  from  the  most  exciting  of  the 
scenes,  laid  his  head  upon  the  pillow,  and  slept  like  a 
child ;  that  if  ever  he  had  a  bad  night  he  was  good  for  noth- 
ing the  next  day,  but  that  this  very  rarely  happened. 

Greville's  Journal  has  revived  the  memory  of  the 
Peelites ;  and  an  article  appeared  the  other  day,  by  the 
survivor  and  the  most  renowned  of  the  group,  in  which, 
as  a  set  of  men  taking  their  own  course  and  remaining 
outside  the  regular  parties,  they  were  designated  as  a 
public  nuisance.1  One  cannot  help  surmising  that  they 

P  This  refers  to  Gladstone's  article  on  "  The  History  of  1852-60, 
and  Greville's  latest  Journals"  in  The  English  Historical  Review 
for  April,  1887,  Volume  II,  page  258.  Much  of  this  chapter  con- 
sists of  passages  taken  from  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  article  on  "  The 
Peelites"  in  Macmillan's  Magazine  of  October,  1887.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  201 

incurred  this  severe  judgment  in  some  measure  by  their 
similarity  to  a  set  of  public  men  who  at  the  present  time 
are  so  misguided  as  to  refuse  at  the  call  of  a  party 
leader  to  say  what  they  think  false  and  to  do  what  they 
think  wrong.  It  is  the  car  of  the  Caucus  Juggernaut 
rolling  backwards  over  political  history.1 

Though  I  never  was  in  public  life,  I  saw  a  good  deal 
of  some  of  the  Peelites,  and  from  them  heard  about  the 
rest  more  than  after  the  lapse  of  many  years  I  can  re- 
member. The  acquaintance  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle 
I  made  through  our  common  tutor  at  Eton,  Edward 
Coleridge,  who  died  the  other  day,2  and  of  whom, 
amidst  the  flood  of  biography,  I  wonder  no  memoir  has 
appeared.  Coleridge  was  the  Arnold  of  Eton.  He  was 
a  very  Eton  Arnold,  it  is  true ;  and  as  he  was  not  head 
master,  but  only  an  assistant,  his  sphere  was  rather  his 
own  pupil-room  than  the  school.  But  in  that  sphere, 
and  in  his  own  way,  he  did  for  the  very  dry  bones  of 
education  at  Eton  what  Arnold  did  at  Rugby.  "My 
Tutor  "  was  greatly  beloved,  as  he  deserved  to  be,  by 
all  his  pupils,  and  the  connection  always  remained  a 

f1  This  sentence  occurs  in  the  article  on  "  The  Peelites  "  in  Mac- 
millan's  Magazine  for  October,  1887.  —  It  will  be  remembered  that 
Mr.  Gladstone  adopted  a  Home  Rule  policy  in  March  of  the  pre- 
vious year,  bringing  in  his  Home  Rule  Bill  in  the  following  month  ; 
and  that  the  definite  formation  of  the  Liberal  Unionist  Party 
occurred  twelve  months  later,  seven  months  before  the  appearance 
of  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  article.] 

[»  May  the  18th,  1883.  —  Edward  Coleridge  was  Fellow  of  Exeter 
College,  Oxford,  1823-1826 ;  Assistant  Master  at  Eton,  1824-1850 ; 
Lower  Master,  1850-1857 ;  Fellow,  1857 ;  Vicar  of  Maple  Durham, 
Berks,  from  1862  till  his  death.] 


202  REMINISCENCES 

bond.  It  drew  together  even  those  who,  like  the  Duke 
and  myself,  had  not  been  contemporaries  at  Eton. 

I  passed  a  summer  with  Cardwell  in  the  Phoenix  Park 
when  he  was  Secretary  for  Ireland,  and  there  had  the 
advantage  both  of  observing  Irish  government  and  of 
hearing  Lord  O'Hagan,  Sir  Alexander  McDonnell  the 
head  of  the  Education  Department,  Dr.  Russell  the 
Principal  of  Maynooth,  and  other  wise  and  patriotic 
Irishmen,  on  the  Irish  Question.1 

Of  Sidney  Herbert  I  did  not  see  so  much.  He  was 
the  model  of  a  high-bred  English  gentleman  in  public 
life.  To  the  elevation  of  his  character,  fully  as  much 
as  to  his  powers  of  mind,  he  owed  his  high  position,  his 
designation  as  a  Prime  Minister  that  was  to  be,  and  the 
tears  shed  over  his  early  grave.  He  had  the  advantage 
of  rank  and  wealth;  not  of  rank  and  wealth  only,  but 
of  historic  rank  and  of  wealth  associated  with  the 
poetry  of  Wilton.  Of  aristocracy  he  was  the  very  flower. 
The  special  qualities  of  leadership  he  can  hardly  be  said 
to  have  shown,  and  though  he  administered  the  War 
Office  well,  I  should  not  suppose  that  his  power  of  work 
rivalled  that  which  was  possessed  by  some  of  his  asso- 
ciates. He  had,  however,  beneath  a  quiet  bearing, 
and  a  slight  appearance  of  aristocratic  listlessness, 
plenty  of  courage  and  not  a  little  force  of  character. 
Disraeli,  who  hated  him  as  Peel's  " gentleman,"  at- 
tacked him  bitterly  and  found  that  he  had  better  have 
let  him  alone.  "If  a  man  wishes  to  see  humiliation, 

f1  Notes  on  these  names  will  be  found  in  Chapter  XVIII.] 


CONNECTION   WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  203 

let  him  look  there,"  said  Sidney  Herbert,  pointing  at 
Disraeli,  who  had  thrown  over  Protection,  with  his 
finger,  beneath  which  even  Disraeli  cowered.  Sidney 
Herbert  was  a  High  Churchman,  and  Wilton  Church 
shows  that  the  aesthetic  element  of  the  school  was 
strong  in  him.  Mr.  Gladstone,  as  all  the  world  knows, 
was  a  High  Churchman  also;  so  in  a  less  degree  was 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle ;  and  the  combination  of  political 
Liberalism  with  Ritualism  may  be  said  to  have  had  its 
origin  in  the  secession  of  the  Peelites  from  the  Tory 
party. 

Of  Lord  Canning  I  saw  something  in  connection  with 
the  Oxford  University  Reform  Bill,  with  which  he  was 
charged  in  the  House  of  Lords,  and  for  the  debate  on 
which  I  was  set  to  cram  him.  He  seemed  to  me,  I  con- 
fess, slow  of  apprehension  and  somewhat  puzzle-headed. 
It  was  believed  that  he  was  sent  to  India  to  get  him  out 
of  the  Cabinet  where  he  gave  trouble  by  his  opinionative- 
ness;  and  everybody  shuddered,  when  the  Mutiny 
broke  out,  at  the  thought  that  India  was  in  his  hands. 
I  was  dining  with  Sir  Charles  Trevelyan,1  who  had 
been  head  of  a  College  in  India,  and  a  Chairman  of  the 
East  Indian  Company  was  one  of  the  guests,  when  news 
arrived  of  the  capture  of  Delhi  by  the  Sepoy  mutineers. 
Great  was  the  consternation.  It  was  increased  by  mis- 
trust of  Lord  Canning,  then  Governor-General  of  India. 
Canning  had  been  advanced  by  Peel  as  a  tribute  to  the 

[»  Sir  Charles  Edward  Trevelyan,  Baronet,  of  Wallington.  1807- 
1886.] 


204  REMINISCENCES 

shade  of  his  father,  to  whom,  however,  Peel  had  never 
done  the  wrong  of  which  Bentinck,  prompted  by  his 
friend,  accused  him.  But  he  was  slow  of  intellect,  as  I 
found  when  I  had  to  coach  him  for  the  debate  on  the 
Oxford  University  Bill.  In  the  Cabinet  his  opinion- 
ativeness  gave  trouble,  and  it  was  understood  that  he 
had  been  sent  to  India,  then  perfectly  quiet,  to  get  him 
out  of  the  way.  These  misgivings  he  nobly  belied.  He 
met  the  tremendous  peril  well,  and  saved  the  character 
of  the  country  by  keeping  control  over  the  bloodthirsty 
frenzy  of  the  dominant  race,  and  thereby  earning  for 
himself  the  epithet,  meant  as  opprobrious,  but  really 
glorious,  of  "Clemency  Canning."  What  the  frenzy  in 
India  was  and  into  what  jeopardy  it  brought  the  honour 
of  the  Imperial  country  may  be  learned  from  the  letters 
of  the  good  Lord  Elgin1  and  from  those  of  Russell2  to  the 
Times.  One  Commander  proposed  impalement.  In 
England  also  frenzy  reigned,  and  horrible  were  the 
yellings  of  literary  eunuchs  displaying  their  virility  by 
cries  for  blood.  Philanthropy  itself  in  the  person  of 
Lord  Shaftesbury  3  was  carried  away  so  far  as  to  coun- 
tenance stories  of  the  mutilation  of  Englishmen  by  the 
rebels,  which,  after  bringing  on  a  storm  of  vengeful  fury, 
proved  unfounded.  We  had  a  terrible  lesson  on  the 
moral  perils  of  the  Empire. 

Lord  Dalhousie's  government  of  India  and  his  State 

I1  James,  the  eighth  Earl.]  . 

Vf.&.,     [2  Alexander  Russell,  journalist.     1814-1876.]     \ 
[*  Anthony  Ashley  Cooper,  eighth  Earl.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  205 

Papers  relating  to  it  were  another  proof  of  Peel's  suc- 
cess in  forming  administrators.  This  may  be  said 
without  raising  any  question  as  to  his  Indian  policy. 
His  name  as  a  member  of  the  British  Parliament  is 
connected  with  what  has  always  seemed  to  me  the 
weakest  point  in  Peel's  career,  the  abandonment,  on 
the  eve  of  the  railway-mania,  of  the  policy  of  control 
over  the  construction  of  railways  which  Lord  Dalhousie 
had  earnestly  recommended  and  afterwards  applied, 
as  Governor-General,  to  the  railway  system  of  India. 
Peel's  extreme  unwillingness  to  interfere  with  the  opera- 
tions of  trade  and  commercial  enterprise  was  a  fault 
on  the  right  side,  but  it  was  a  fault. 

Graham,1  as  well  as  Cardwell,  always  seemed  to  me 
a  striking  instance  of  the  weakness  of  the  system  which 
inseparably  connects  the  duty  of  an  administrator  with 
that  of  a  legislator  on  organic  questions.  As  an  admin- 
istrator he  was  first-rate.  At  the  beginning  of  the 
Crimean  War  he  got  the  navy  with  wonderful  rapidity 
into  first-rate  order.  He  was  also  excellent  as  a  speaker, 
both  in  force  and  clearness.  On  the  organic  questions 
with  regard  to  the  greatest  of  which  he  had  played 
leading  parts  as  a  member  of  the  Grey  Government, 
he  seemed  to  trim  and  to  be  playing  a  game  of  his  own. 
But  Parker's  Life  2  of  him  apparently  shows  that  the 
apparent  trimming  was  really  an  honest  avoidance  of 

[l  Sir  James  Graham,  second  Baronet,  of  Netherby.] 

[2  "  Life  and  Letters  of  Sir  James  Graham  second  Baronet  of 

Netherby,  P.C.,  G.C.B."    1792-1861.    By  Charles  Stuart  Parker. 

2  vols.     London :  Murray.     1907.] 


206  REMINISCENCES 

doubtful  combinations  at  the  expense  of  his  personal 
ambition.  Graham's  reputation  and  influence  were  so 
high  that  it  was  said  he  could  command  fifty  votes  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  his  foot  was  on  the 
steps  of  power  when  he  died  and  in  a  moment  was 
forgotten. 

Of  Lord  Aberdeen  personally  I  saw  nothing.  But 
from  what  his  associates  said  in  private,  as  well  as  from 
his  public  conduct,  I  learned  to  feel  the  greatest  respect 
for  him.  It  seemed  to  me  that  with  him  for  Foreign 
Minister  England  presented  herself  to  other  govern- 
ments as  an  English  gentleman  presents  himself  to 
his  fellows,  upright  and  honourable  in  all  his  dealings, 
careful  to  maintain  his  own  rights  and  dignity,  and 
equally  careful  to  respect  those  of  other  people.  No- 
body ever  suspected  Lord  Aberdeen  of  trickery,  of 
intrigue,  or  deception  of  any  kind.  His  despatches 
bear  the  marks  of  perfect  straightforwardness  and 
truth.  Though  Conservative  in  diplomacy,  he  was  not 
illiberal;  he  declared  for  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws 
before  any  of  his  colleagues,  and  he  never  refused  his 
assent  to  any  measure  of  domestic  reform.  He  it 
was  who,  sitting  at  Wellington's  side  when  the  Duke 
made  his  fatal  declaration  against  any  reform  of  Par- 
liament, told  him  that  he  had  undone  the  party.  On 
the  other  hand,  he  was  anti-revolutionary,  and  never 
conspired  or  caballed  for  propagandist  objects  against 
the  Governments  with  which  he  had  to  deal.  He  kept 
for  his  country  all  her  friends,  and  never  made  her  an 


CONNECTION   WITH   PUBLIC  MEN  207 

enemy.     On  the  Neapolitan  question  we  should  have 
liked  him  to  be  less  discreet. 

Of  Lord  Russell,1  better  known  in  history  as  Lord 
John  Russell,  I  saw  most  towards  the  end  of  his  life, 
when  he  was  living  at  Richmond,  and  my  wife  and  I 
were  spending  a  summer  on  the  Terrace.  I  then 
conversed  a  good  deal  with  him.  He  had  a  vast  his- 
toric name  as  the  mover  of  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832 
and  the  veteran  leader  of  the  Whig  party  in  Parlia- 
ment. But  I  never  could  think  him  very  great.  He 
was  the  reverse  of  Peel;  not  being  a  first-rate  admin- 
istrator, he  was  prone  to  recruit  his  popularity  by 
appeals  to  the  desire  of  organic  change.  It  is  difficult 
not  to  believe  that  this  propensity  was  working  in  him 
when  after  his  explicit  declaration  of  finality  he  declared 
for  fresh  extensions  of  the  suffrage,  and  wept  with 
mortification  upon  being  forced  to  drop  his  Bill.  He 
professed  a  belief  in  the  elevating  and  purifying  in- 
fluence of  responsibility  on  the  political  character  and 
conduct  of  the  people,  in  which  perhaps  he  may  have 
been  sincere.  He  was  not  magnanimous.  Nothing 
could  justify  or  excuse  his  coalition  with  the  Protection- 
ists to  turn  out  Peel,  nominally  on  the  question  of  the 
Irish  Coercion  Bill,  really  on  that  of  Protection,  when 
he  had  himself  acknowledged  the  necessity  for  the  Bill 
and  had  committed  himself  to  free  trade.  Holding 
office  in  the  Coalition  Ministry  of  Lord  Aberdeen,  he 

P  First  Earl  Russell ;  third  son  of  John  Russell,  sixth  Duke  of 
Bedford.  1792-1878.] 


208  REMINISCENCES 

was  too  sensible  of  the  sacrifice  which  he  had  made, 
and  wanting  in  hearty  loyalty  to  his  chief.  His  deser- 
tion of  his  colleagues  when  Roebuck  *  gave  notice  of  a 
motion  of  censure,  proved,  as  was  said  at  the  time,  that 
he  had  not  been  at  a  Public  School.  Nor  was  much 
greatness  of  mind  or  exalted  patriotism  shown  by  his 
eagerness  to  embarrass  and  trip  up  Peel  in  the  Corn 
Law  crisis  of  1846.  Still,  he  played  a  great  part  with 
ability,  and  as  a  party  leader  in  the  House  of  Commons 
had  shown  consummate  skill.  Of  the  speakers  he  had 
heard  he  thought  the  three  best  were  Plunket,2  Can- 
ning, and  Peel.  Plunket,  if  I  remember  rightly,  he 
thought  the  most  persuasive ;  Canning  the  most  charm- 
ing; Peel  the  most  formidable  in  debate.  He  was  him- 
self by  no  means  a  first-rate  speaker,  though  in  his 
speeches  there  was  almost  always  something  above  the 
common  mark. 

I  saw  something  of  Lord  Granville,3  a  thoroughly 
diplomatic  personage,  most  graceful  and  engaging. 
"Puss,"  he  was  nicknamed  from  his  gentleness.  But 
when  he  was  stirred,  as  he  was  when  Derby  and  Disraeli 
put  a  spy  at  his  door  to  watch  his  communications  with 
the  Peelites,  it  was  found  that  "Puss  had  claws."  The 
Foreign  Office  seems  to  be  regarded  rather  as  a  sphere 
apart,  the  holder  of  which  is  not  bound  thoroughly 

P  John  Arthur  Roebuck,  M.P.  for  Bath.     1801-1879.] 
P  William  Conyngham  Plunket,  first  Baron  Plunket,  Lord  Chan- 
cellor of  Ireland.     1764-1854.] 

P  Granville  George  Leveson-Gower,  second  Earl  of  Granville. 
1815-1891.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  209 

to  share  the  general  policy  of  the  Government,  but  only 
to  preserve  the  outward  unity  of  the  Cabinet  by  his 
vote.  Lord  Rosebery  1  evidently  was  not  a  Home 
Ruler  when  he  gave  a  regulation  vote  for  Gladstone's 
measure  of  Home  Rule.2  I  can  hardly  believe  that 
Lord  Granville  heartily  concurred  in  Gladstone's 
Irish  policy,  though  he  retained  the  Foreign  Office 
under  Gladstone.  Sitting  beside  him  at  dinner  and 
talking  to  him  about  politics,  I  was  struck  by  the  con- 
servatism of  his  tone.  Grandees  covet  the  office  which 
brings  them  into  the  grand  circle  of  Europe. 

Among  my  London  associates  was  Godley,  the 
founder  of  Canterbury  in  New  Zealand,  a  notable  man 
in  his  way.  As  a  model  colony  and  a  High  Church 
Utopia,  Canterbury  failed,  as  all  model  colonies  do; 
as  did  afterwards  the  model  colony  in  Tennessee,  in 
which  Thomas  Hughes  3  embarked.  The  colonist  who 
has  come  out  only  to  better  himself  materially  does 
not  share  the  enthusiasm  for  the  ideal.  But  the 
settlers  brought  out  by  Godley  to  Canterbury,  being  of 
a  respectable  and  religious  class,  were,  like  the  Puritan 
colonists,  a  good  moral  foundation. 

Neither  Godley  nor  Sir  Frederic  Rogers  nor  any  of 
the  authorities  on  colonization  with  whom  I  used  to 
converse  in  those  days  had  the  slightest  tincture  of  the 

t1  Archibald  Philip  Primrose,  fifth  Earl  of  Rosebery.] 

[2  September  the  8th,  1893,  when  the  House  of  Lords  defeated,  by 

419  to  41,  Gladstone's  second  Home  Rule  Bill.] 

[3  County  Court  Judge,  author  of  "Tom  Brown's  School  Days." 

1822-1896.] 


210  REMINISCENCES 

Imperialism  which  we  are  now  called  upon,  on  pain  of 
being  damned  as  "Little  Englanders,"  to  embrace. 
All  looked  forward  to  colonial  independence,  and  re- 
garded England  as  the  destined  mother  of  free  nations. 
I  believe  I  am  right  also  in  thinking  that  some  even  of 
the  most  Conservative  regarded  the  ultimate  union  of 
Canada  with  the  rest  of  her  continent  as  probable  if 
not  certain.  These  men  were  not  less  regardful  and 
proud  of  the  grandeur  of  their  country,  though  more 
modest  in  their  aims  for  her,  than  are  members  of 
Imperial  Leagues.  They  thought  that  the  greatness 
and  power  of  England  were  not  in  her  dependencies,  but 
in  herself.  They  also  felt  the  value  of  insular  security 
and  the  weakness  of  an  Empire  open  to  attack  in  all 
parts  of  the  globe. 

It  is  with  pleasure  that  I  find  among  my  correspon- 
dence a  letter  from  Joseph  Chamberlain  l  deprecating 
my  opposition  to  his  scheme  of  planting  in  each  of  the 
cities  a  Radical  Caucus  to  control  the  representation 
which  would  have  been  his  tool.  He  was  then  in  his 
extreme  Radical  phase,  threatening  to  make  property 
pay  a  ransom  for  its  existence.  I  saw  the  man's  whole 
career.  It  was  that  of  a  political  gambler  laying  his 
stakes,  now  on  Rouge,  now  on  Noir.  He  was  taken 
into  Gladstone's  Government  to  please  the  Radical 
wing  of  the  party,  and  intrigued  against  his  chief, 
working  up  outside  the  Cabinet  a  party  for  himself, 

[l  The  Right  Honourable  Joseph  Chamberlain,  M.P.  for  Birming- 
ham since  1885 ;  Secretary  of  State  for  the  Colonies,  1895-1903.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  211 

and  drawing  from  Gladstone,  as  Labouchere  told  us  in 
Truth,  about  the  bitterest  words  that  ever  fell  from 
Mr.  Gladstone's  lips ;  at  that  time,  Gladstone,  being  still 
Unionist,  Chamberlain  for  Home  Rule  and  in  its  extreme 
form/  that  of  federation.  If  Wemyss  Reid's  state- 
ment'1 regarding  the  ownership  of  the  Pall  Matt  Ga- 
zette is  true,  Chamberlain  must  have  been  attacking  his 
colleague  in  the  Government,  Forster,  from  behind, 
when  Forster  was  struggling  with  insurrection  in  Ire- 
land. When  Gladstone  was  talking  Home  Rule, 
Chamberlain  turned  against  it,  and  without  apology 
or  explanation  went  over  to  the  Conservative  camp, 
became  a  Jingo,  presently  took  office  under  the  high 
Tory  and  Imperialist,  Lord  Salisbury,2  and  drew  the 
country  into  the  Boer  War.3  His  next  move  was  a 
repetition  against  Balfour  of  the  manoeuvre  practised 
against  Gladstone.  After  getting  rid  by  a  trick  of  the 
free-trade  members  of  the  Cabinet,  Chamberlain  went 
out  of  it,  leaving  his  son  to  work  as  his  confederate  in  it, 
got  up  a  Protectionist  movement  of  his  own,  captured 
the  party  organization  and  press,  meaning  when  this 
was  done  to  press  a  dissolution  and  drive  Balfour  on 
the  rocks.  This  he  did.  But  the  vessel  was  driven  on 
the  rocks  too  hard.  To  Chamberlain  was  due  the  Boer 


P  See  "Memoirs  of  Sir  Wemyss  Reid,  1842-1885."  Edited, 
with  an  Introduction,  by  Stuart  J.  Reid.  London :  Cassell.  1905. 
Chapter  XV.] 

[2  He  was  Colonial  Secretary  in  Lord  Salisbury's  Coalition  Min- 
istry of  June,  1895.] 

[3  October,  1899.] 


212  REMINISCENCES 

War,  the  consequences  of  which,  after  seeing  them  on 
the  spot,  led  him  to  cover  them  by  an  agitation  for 
Tariff  Reform,  as  he  and  his  followers  call  Protection. 

Another  public  man  with  whom  I  was  brought  into 
connection,  though  more  by  correspondence  than  per- 
sonally, was  Earl  Grey,1  with  whose  moderate  Liberal- 
ism in  politics  I  sympathized.  Macaulay  spoke  very 
harshly  of  him  because  his  refusal  to  form  a  Govern- 
ment of  which  Palmerston,  the  universal  disturber, 
was  to  be  Foreign  Minister  formed  the  ostensible  cause 
of  Russell's  failure  to  form  a  Government  upon  Peel's 
resignation  in  1846.  Lord  Grey's  temper  may  not 
have  been  very  compliant;  but  he  was  a  thoroughly 
upright  statesman  and  if  he  or  any  one  minded  as  he 
was  could  have  held  the  helm,  all  would  have  gone  on 
pretty  well.  We  corresponded  a  good  deal,  and  he  was 
a  very  old  man  when  I  received  from  him  a  letter  in 
thirty  quarto  pages  on  the  political  situation. 

P  The  third  Earl  Grey.    1802-1894.] 


CONNECTION  WITH  PUBLIC  MEN  213 

NOTE  BY  THE  EDITOR 

I  append  here  Disraeli's  letter  to  Peel  alluded  to  on  page 
177;  also  parts  of  the  speeches  of  Peel  and  Disraeli  made  in 
the  House  of  Commons  when  this  letter  was  referred  to  by 
the  first-named. 

"GROSVENOB  GATE,  Sept.  5,  1841. 
"DEAR  SIR  ROBERT, — 

"I  have  shrunk  from  obtruding  myself  upon  you  at  this  moment, 
and  should  have  continued  to  do  so  if  there  were  any  one  on  whom  I 
could  rely  to  express  my  feelings. 

"  I  am  not  going  to  trouble  you  with  claims  similar  to  those  with 
which  you  must  be  wearied.  I  will  not  say  that  I  have  fought  since 
1834  four  contests  for  your  party,  that  I  have  expended  great  sums, 
have  exerted  my  intelligence  to  the  utmost  for  the  propagation  of 
your  policy,  and  have  that  position  in  life  which  can  command  a 
costly  seat. 

"But  there  is  one  peculiarity  in  my  case  on  which  I  cannot  be 
silent.  I  have  had  to  struggle  against  a  storm  of  political  hate  and 
malice  which  few  men  ever  experienced,  from  the  moment,  at  the 
instigation  of  a  member  of  your  Cabinet,  I  enrolled  myself  under  your 
banner,  and  I  have  only  been  sustained  under  these  trials  by  the 
conviction  that  the  day  would  come  when  the  foremost  man  of  this 
country  would  publicly  testify  that  he  had  some  respect  for  my 
ability  and  my  character. 

"I  confess,  to  be  unrecognized  at  this  moment  by  you  appears  to 
me  to  be  overwhelming,  and  I  appeal  to  your  own  heart  —  to  that 
justice  and  that  magnanimity  which  I  feel  are  your  characteristics  — 
to  save  me  from  an  intolerable  humiliation. 

"Believe  me,  dear  Sir  Robert, 

"Your  faithful  servant, 

"B.  DISRAELI." 

(Parker's  "Life  of  Peel,"  Vol.  II,  page  486.) 
Peel's  Speech:  — 

"Sir,  I  will  only  say  of  that  hon.  gentleman  that  if  he,  after 
reviewing  the  whole  of  my  public  life  —  a  life  extending  over  thirty 
years  previously  to  my  accession  to  office  in  1841  —  if  he  then  enter- 
tained the  opinion  of  me  which  he  now  professes ;  if  he  thought  I 


214  REMINISCENCES 

was  guilty  of  these  petty  larcenies  from  Mr.  Horner  and  others,  it 
is  a  little  surprising  that  in  the  spring  of  1841,  after  his  long  expe- 
rience of  my  public  career,  he  should  have  been  prepared  to  give  me 
his  confidence.  It  is  still  more  surprising  that  he  should  have  been 
ready,  as  I  think  he  was,  to  unite  his  fortunes  with  mine  in  office, 
thus  implying  the  strongest  proof  which  any  public  man  can  give  of 
confidence  in  the  honour  and  integrity  of  a  Minister  of  the  Crown." 
Hansard,  3  S.  Ixxxvi,  689. 

Disraeli's  Speech :  — 

"I  never  shall  —  it  is  totally  foreign  to  my  nature  —  make  an 
application  for  any  place.  But  in  1841,  when  the  Government  was 
formed  —  I  am  sorry  to  touch  upon  such  a  matter,  but  insinuations 
have  been  made  by  paragraphs  in  the  newspapers,  and  now  by 
charges  in  this  House  —  I  have  never  adverted  to  the  subject,  but 
when  these  charges  are  made,  I  must.  —  In  1841,  when  the  Govern- 
ment was  formed,  an  individual  possessing,  as  I  believe  him  to 
possess,  the  most  intimate  and  complete  confidence  of  the  right 
hon.  gentleman,  called  on  me  and  communicated  with  m'e.  There 
was  certainly  some  conversation  —  I  have  certainly  never  adverted 
to  these  circumstances,  and  should  not  now  unless  compelled,  be- 
cause they  were  under  a  seal  of  secrecy  confided  in  me  —  there  was 
some  communication,  not  at  all  of  that  nature  which  the  House 
perhaps  supposes,  between  the  right  hon.  gentleman  and  me,  but  of 
the  most  amicable  kind.  I  can  only  say  this  —  It  was  a  transaction 
not  originated  by  me,  but  which  any  gentleman,  I  care  not  how  high 
his  honour  or  spirit,  might  entertain  to-morrow." 

Hansard,  3  S.  Ixxxvi,  707-708. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE   MANCHESTER  SCHOOL 

Objects  of  the  School  —  Peace  Policy — Anti-Imperialism  —  Bright 
and  Cobden  —  Socialism  —  Property  —  The  Irish  Question. 

THE  members  of  the  Manchester  School,  or  most  of 
them,  are  in  their  graves.  The  youngest  survivors 
must  be  seventy.  The  other  day  I  was  reading  the 
obituary  of  my  old  friend  Sir  James  Stansfield  1  and 
thinking  that  I  must  be  about  the  last  left  of  my  circle, 
when  I  received  an  engraving  of  the  portrait  of  Sir 
Thomas  Bazley,2  a  leader  of  the  Manchester  School. 
In  thanking  him  I  said  how  much  pleasure  it  gave  me 
to  know  that  there  were  two  of  us  still  alive.  I  re- 
ceived an  answer  from  his  son,  saying  that  it  was  he 
that  had  sent  the  portrait,  that  his  own  age  was  seventy, 
and  that  his  father,  my  friend,  if  he  were  alive,  would 
be  one  hundred  and  two. 

The  object  of  the  School  was  economical.  Imperial- 
ism and  Militarism  it  opposed  on  economical  grounds 
as  enemies  to  trade  and  frugality.  It  had  nothing  to 
do  with  Socialism,  but  on  the  contrary  was  always  for 
the  liberty  to  which  Socialism  would  put  an  end.  For 

[»  1820-1898.  Held  various  high  political  posts ;  M.P.  for  Hali- 
fax ;  Under-Secretary  of  State  for  India ;  etc.] 

[2  1797-1885.     Cotton  manufacturer  and  politician.] 

215 


216  REMINISCENCES 

peace  and  reduction  of  armaments  it  pleaded  as  a  whole 
on  economical,  its  leaders  on  philanthropic,  grounds. 

1  "School  "  and  not  "Party  "  is  the  right  term.  The 
circle  never  was  formed  into  a  party,  never  put  forth 
a  general  programme,  had  not  even  recognized  leaders, 
though  it  looked  up  to  Bright  and  Cobden.  Its  only 
organization  was  the  Anti-Corn-Law  League,2  in  which 
it  had  its  origin,  and  which  brought  its  chiefs  to  the 
front.  No  doubt,  on  the  part  of  the  manufacturers 
who  formed  the  League,  self-interest  was  strong. 
Some  of  them,  when  they  had  gained  their  commercial 
object,  or,  as  Cobden  said  with  his  usual  simplicity, 
when  "their  gross,  pocket  question  was  settled,"  fell 
away  politically,  and  even  became  Tories.  The  senti- 
ment of  class,  manufacturer  against  squire,  also  made 
itself  felt.  Unhappily,  without  gross  pocket  questions 
or  sectional  sentiment,  you  will  not  often  find  a  suffi- 
cient motive  power;  and  it  was  by  self-interest  on  the 
part  of  a  Parliament  of  landowners  that  the  Corn  Law 
had  been  imposed. 

That  Free  Trade  has  not  made  the  progress  in  the 
world  which  at  the  moment  of  victory  its  English  cham- 
pions hoped  and  predicted,  is  true;  yet  the  mockery 
with  which  the  prophets  are  assailed  is  unjust.  What 
has  arrested  the  progress  of  Free  Trade?  Not  change 
of  conviction,  but  the  political  power  of  sinister  inter- 

[l  What  follows,  down  to  page  237,  appeared  in  the  Contemporary 
Review,  March,  1895,  Volume  LXVII,  pages  377-388.] 

[2  Founded  in  January,  1839.     It  was  dissolved  July  2,  1846.] 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  217 

ests,  international  antipathies,  cultivated  for  the  pur- 
poses of  Protection,  and,  above  all,  the  necessity  of  tax- 
ation created  by  bloated  armaments,  for  the  existence 
of  which  Manchester  peace-mongers  assuredly  have 
not  to  answer.  The  Protectionist  tariff  of  the  United 
States  itself  was  a  war-tariff.  While  Protectionism  L/j 
reigned  in  American  legislation,  almost  all  the  pro- 
fessors  of  political  economy  in  the  American  Univer- 
sities, and  the  writers  on  economy  generally,  were 
on  the  side  of  Free  Trade. 

To  the  taunt  that  the  world  had  not  continued  to 
move  in  the  direction  of  Cobden's  policy,  Free  Trade 
and  peace,  Cobden  could  reply,  so  much  the  worse  for 
the  world.  He  could  not  help  the  revival  of  the  war 
spirit,  nor  in  1850  could  he  well  have  foreseen  it.  Pitt's 
economical  calculations  were  suddenly  wrecked  by  the 
French  Revolution.  It  was  to  the  United  States  that 
Cobden  looked  with  special  hope,  and  there  all  was 
changed  by  the  War  of  Secession.  That  Cobden  was 
not  free  from  the  enthusiasm  of  his  convictions,  and 
that  he  overrated  the  power  of  his  economic  talisman, 
has  already  been  admitted. 

The  League  having  done  its  work,  and  the  bond 
which  it  created  having  come  to  an  end,  there  remained 
the  school  of  political  thought  which  it  had  formed. 
There  was  plenty  of  room  in  that  school  for  differences 
of  opinion  on  particular  questions,  and  for  varieties  of 
degree  in  the  application  of  the  general  principles  which 
were  held  in  common.  "To  try  to  square  the  policy 


218  REMINISCENCES 

of  the  country  with  the  maxims  of  common  sense  and 
of  a  plain  morality "  was  Bright's  description  of  his 
own  aim,  and  it  was  the  general  aim  of  his  school. 

Peace-mongers,  Quakers,  and  Little  Englanders  were 
epithets  freely  bestowed  on  us  by  the  Jingoes.  If 
anybody  can  persuade  himself  that  a  Europe  armed  to 
the  teeth  and  consuming  a  large  part  of  its  earnings  in 
preparation  for  war  is  a  blessing,  he  may  call  us  any 
names  he  pleases.  We  did  not  preach  defencelessness, 
or  tame  submission  to  wrong.  Cobden  said  that  in 
a  just  war,  though  he  could  not  serve  in  the  field,  he 
would  serve  in  the  hospital.  Bright  was  a  Quaker, 
but  he  had  tacitly  dropped  the  extreme  sentiments  as 
well  as  the  garb  and  dialect  of  his  community,  and 
never,  I  believe,  in  his  later  years,  said  anything  against 
national  defence.  He  was  a  member  of  a  Government 
which  had  the  army  and  navy  in  its  charge,  though 
he  never  administered,  and  would  no  doubt  have 
refused  to  administer,  a  War  Department.  That  he 
would  have  been  extreme  in  his  peace  policy  I  do  not 
doubt.  But  surely,  for  an  industrial  people  dependent 
on  trade  for  its  daily  bread,  if  not  for  a  warlike  aris- 
tocracy, his  was  the  right  extreme.  The  School  stead- 
fastly opposed  Palmerston  with  his  Civis  Romanus  sum 
and  his  Russian  and  Chinese  wars.  On  the  question 
of  the  war  with  China  he  beat  us,  and  unseated  our 
chiefs  in  a  general  election  by  an  appeal  to  what  he 
called  the  honour  of  the  country.  Let  Palmerston's 
admirers  read  the  letters  of  his  own  envoy  to  China, 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  219 

Lord  Elgin,  in  Walrond's  excellent  Life,1  and  say  by 
whom  the  real  honour  of  the  country  was  best  upheld. 
For  nothing  was  the  Manchester  School  more  denounced 
than  for  its  steady  opposition  to  what  was  supposed 
to  be  the  patriotic  policy  of  perennial  enmity  to  Russia 
and  of  propping  up  the  Turkish  Empire  in  Europe. 
What  now  remains  of  the  fruits  of  the  Crimean  War 
but  the  Crimean  graves,  and  to  what  has  Turkish  Em- 
pire come? 

Another  example  is  that  of  the  Boer  War,  which  the 
Manchester  School  would  assuredly  have  opposed,  as 
a  great  Manchester  journal  most  gallantly  did  oppose, 
and  the  only  fruit  of  which  was  the  loss  of  two  hundred 
and  fifty  millions  of  money  and  a  far  worse  loss  of 
honour,  xi-t)  ***~ft^  A^fe**#  t4r+4' 

It  was  always  possible,  as  I  can  bear  witness,  to 
belong  to  the  Manchester  School,  and  at  the  same  time 
to  regard  the  British  army  and  navy  with  the  heartiest 
attachment  and  their  achievements  with  the  liveliest 
pride;  though  it  was  not  possible  for  any  one  belong- 
ing to  the  Manchester  School  to  join  in  the  Jingo 
choruses  of  the  music-halls,  or  to  forget  the  responsi- 
bility that  rests  on  every  civilian  who  incites  to  war. 
On  this  subject  there  were  different  shades  of  sentiment 
among  us.  Some  of  us  thought,  and,  as  the  event 

[l  "  Letters  and  Journals  of  James,  Eighth  Earl  of  Elgin,  Governor 
of  Jamaica,  Governor-General  of  Canada,  Envoy  to  China,  Viceroy 
of  India."  Edited  by  Theodore  Walrond,  C.B.  With  a  Preface  by 
Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley,  D.D.,  Dean  of  Westminster.  London: 
Murray.  1872.] 


220  REMINISCENCES 

proved,  with  reason,  that  Bright  and  Cobden  were 
too  much  inclined  to  rely  on  the  good  faith  of  the 
French  Emperor  *  and  to  deride  the  necessity  of  pre- 
parations against  his  restlessness,  his  necessities,  and 
the  schemes  to  which  his  necessities  gave  birth.  The 
extravagances  of  the  panic-mongers  had  driven  them 
to  the  opposite  extreme.  They  also,  perhaps,  gave  the 
Emperor  credit  for  better  motives  than  those  which 
really  actuated  him  in  making  the  commercial  treaty. 
They  did  wrong,  as  some  of  their  followers  thought  and 
think,  in  discouraging  the  volunteer  movement.  They, 
however,  did  not  quarrel  with  those  among  their  friends 
who  like  myself  enlisted  as  volunteers.  That  the  real 
occasions  for  war  are  very  few,  and  that  instead  of 
courting  and  provoking  it,  every  effort  ought  to  be 
made  to  avert  it  and  to  keep  its  spirit  under  control 
were,  it  is  to  be  believed,  the  only  necessary  articles 
of  the  Manchester  creed  in  relation  to  this  subject. 
For  these  we  must  answer  at  the  tribunal  of  history 
if  we  ever  have  the  honour  to  come  before  it. 

The  question  between  intervention  and  non-inter- 
vention, again,  was  one  on  which,  though  our  general 
principle  was  non-intervention,  we  recognized  no  hard- 
and-fast  line.  To  meddling  with  the  domestic  affairs 
or  institutions  of  other  nations  we  were  generally  op- 
posed. There  would  probably  have  been  difference 
of  opinion  as  to  intervention  in  favour  of  Italian  inde- 
pendence. Garibaldi,  however,  had  passionate  ad- 

[»  Napoleon  III.] 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  221 

mirers  and  supporters  in  the  personal  circle  of  Bright 
and  Cobden.  I  do  not  think  that  any  of  us  denied 
that  there  was  a  community  of  nations,  or  that  a  right 
and  clear  cause  must  be  upheld  and  wrong  put  down. 

Again,  during  the  War  of  Secession  in  the  United 
States,  at  Manchester  was  the  centre  of  opposition  to 
sympathy  and  alliance  with  the  slave  power.  For 
this,  too,  we  were  denounced  as  negrophilists,  enemies 
to  British  interests,  and  patriots  of  every  country 
but  our  own.  Those  reproaches  have  sunk  in  silence. 
We  saw  the  party  of  alliance  with  the  slave  power  go 
into  an  inner  chamber  to  hide  itself,  and  almost 
cringe  to  the  victorious  Republic. 

Just  now  *  the  particular  cry  against  the  School  and 
its  memory  is  that  we  were  anti-colonial  and  wanted  to 
get  rid  of  the  colonies,  a  base  design  in  which  we  are 
triumphantly  told  we  have  failed,  after  being  tantalized 
by  a  near  approach  to  success.  To  get  rid  of  the 
colonies,  as  it  would  be  highly  criminal,  is  happily 
impossible,  the  relation  between  the  Mother-country 
and  a  colony  being  one  which  can  never  be  annulled. 
A  colony  need  not  be  a  dependency,  nor  have  the  most 
successful  colonies  been  dependent.  The  tie  between 
Greek  Mother-country  and  colony  was  strong  though 
purely  parental.  To  promote  colonial  independence 
was  our  aim,  and  a  great  step  towards  it  was  made  by 
the  completion  of  colonial  self-government  and  the  with- 
drawal of  the  troops.  By  the  withdrawal  of  the  troops 

[*  This  was  written  about  January,  1895.] 


222  REMINISCENCES 

the  British  taxpayer  obtained  relief  from  the  expendi- 
ture on  Maori  and  Kaffir  wars  which  had  cost  many 
millions,  and  would  probably  have  continued  so  long 
as  the  colonists  had  British  troops  at  their  command. 
The  colonists  gained  not  less  in  humanity  and  in  self- 
reliance.  By  neither  measure  is  it  now  contended  that 
the  colonies  have  suffered,  or  that  the  mutual  affection 
of  the  Mother-country  and  the  colonies  has  been 
impaired,  much  as  was  said  against  both  at  the  tune. 
Imperial  Federationists  are  now  trying  to  reverse  the 
Manchester  policy.  But  they  have  not  yet  achieved 
any  practical  success.  We  never  wished  to  make 
England  little.  We  believed  that  her  greatness  was 
in  herself,  and  was  only  impaired  by  the  dissipation 
of  her  forces,  and  her  exposure,  through  her  dependen- 
cies, to  attack  in  every  quarter  of  the  globe.  The 
England  of  Cromwell  was  not  little. 

If,  in  regard  to  Imperial  and  foreign  policy  generally, 
the  Manchester  School  has  been  in  favour  of  neutrality, 
moderation,  and  justice,  rather  than  of  meddling, 
bullying,  and  aggression,  surely  there  is  in  this  nothing 
that  need  grate  on  a  patriotic  ear.  Scrupulous  regard 
for  the  rights  and  for  the  honour  of  others,  while  you 
manfully  maintain  your  own,  is  the  rule  of  an  English 
gentleman's  conduct  in  private  life,  and  it  never  entails 
loss  of  dignity,  seldom  loss  of  anything  else.  Review 
the  diplomatic  and  Imperial  history  of  England  in 
this  light,  and  say  which  of  the  two  policies  has  been 
that  of  her  best  rulers,  and  by  which  of  the  two  most 


THE   MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  223 

has  been  gained  or  lost.  Is  it  possible  that  quarrel- 
someness and  aggressiveness  should  be  the  true  policy 
of  a  country  with  a  world-wide  commerce,  with  depend- 
encies open  to  attack  in  every  part  of  the  world,  and 
dependent  on  the  importation  of  raw  materials  ? 

Then,  the  Manchester  men  were  unsentimental. 
They  were  " cotton-spinners  "  and  "bagmen,"  with  the 
gross  and  sordid  notions  of  their  trade.  It  was  not 
likely  that,  owing  its  origin  to  a  commercial  question, 
and  having  its  seat  in  a  manufacturing  centre,  the 
School  would  be  particularly  poetic.  On  some  occa- 
sions, as  in  the  struggle  against  slavery,  the  culture  of 
the  country  was  almost  all  on  the  other  side.  No 
doubt  the  school  had  the  defects  of  its  qualities  and 
the  exaggerations  of  its  principles.  But  if  Bright  and 
Cobden  directed  their  political  efforts  to  the  promotion 
of  material  welfare,  it  was  not  because  they  were  in- 
capable of  appreciating  spiritual  things,  or  set  material 
things  above  them,  but  because  they  thought  that 
the  material  welfare  of  the  people  was  the  special  object 
of  government.  Cobden  said  that  he  valued  religious 
equality  more  than  commercial  freedom.  One  can  only 
smile  at  the  idea  that  there  was  less  of  sentiment  in 
Bright  or  Cobden  than  in  a  Tory  squire  or  colonel. 
In  both  of  them  there  was  rather  more.  Bright  adored 
Milton,  and  read  poetry,  as  well  as  the  Bible,  better 
than  any  other  man  I  ever  heard:  nor  could  any  man 
talk  with  more  interest  on  high  subjects.  Cobden 
was  a  reader  of  Burke,  Spenser,  and  Cervantes,  as  his 


224  REMINISCENCES 

speeches  and  pamphlets  show.  He  read  Demosthenes 
in  a  translation.  Bright's  speeches  are  classic,  and 
Cobden  was  a  first-rate  writer  in  a  plain  style.  His 
heart  was  thoroughly  open  to  beauty  and  to  poetical 
impressions  of  every  kind.  When  he  was  asked  by 
a  friend  who  was  about  to  visit  America  whether 
Niagara  was  worth  a  special  journey,  his  answer  was: 
"There  are  two  sublimities  in  Nature:  one  of  rest,  the 
other  of  motion;  the  sublimity  in  rest  are  the  distant 
Alps,  the  sublimity  of  motion  is  Niagara."  *  Let  it 
be  remembered,  too,  that  a  sentiment,  though  different 
from  that  of  war  and  aggrandizement,  attaches  to  the 
prosperous  industry  which  brings  with  it  kindly  feel- 
ings, self-respect,  cheerful  hearts,  and  happy  homes. 
As  to  character,  our  belief  was  that  if  the  people  were 
prosperous  they  would  be  happy,  and  that  if  they  were 
happy  they  would  as.ja.iule  be  good. 

We  of  the  Manchester  School  were,  or  flattered  our- 
selves that  we  were,  thorough  going  reformers  in  a  prac- 
tical way.  Bright  stood  aloof  from  the  two  aristocratic 
parties,  and  compared  them  to  two  trading  establish- 
ments which  pretended  to  be  rivals,  and  courted  custom 
by  running  each  other  down  till  each  became  bankrupt, 
when  it  turned  out  that  both  were  the  same  concern. 
We  looked  forward  to  the  elimination  of  the  hereditary 
principle  from  legislation.  We  also  looked  forward 
to  the  severance  of  the  connection  between  Church  and 
State,  and  all  the  more  earnestly  when  the  State  clergy 

f1  See  also  Chapter  VI,  page  89.] 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  225 

preached  war,  or  rang  their  church-bells  on  the  acquittal 
of  Governor  Eyre ; 1  though  opposition  to  a  State  Church 
was  not  opposition  to  religion,  for  both  Bright  and 
Cobden  were  religious  men,  and  Cobden  remained  a 
member  of  the  Church  of  England,  saying  that  it  had 
been  the  Church  of  his  mother.  It  seems  that  events 
have  not  condemned  us,  and  it  would  have  been  better 
to  have  considered  betimes  the  expediency  of  changes 
for  contemplating  which  we  were  called  revolutionists. 
Revolutionists  we  never  were,  nor  can  any  revolution- 
ary party  claim  the  allegiance  of  any  of  the  survivors 
of  us.  To  make  the  past  slide  quietly  into  the  future 
was  Bright's  conception  of  statesmanship,  as  expressed 
by  himself.  Peel,  as  the  Minister  of  practical  reform, 
had  our  strong  sympathy.  In  a  memorable  letter, 
Cobden  tendered  him  not  only  sympathy,  but  support. 
Cobden,  as  may  be  gathered  from  Mr.  Morley's  Life 
of  him,  was  rather  indisposed  to  move  in  the  line  of 
organic  change,  and  preferred  to  devote  his  energies 
to  economic  improvement. 

On  looking  back,  I  think  it  must  be  owned  that  we 
were  somewhat  too  trustful  of  the  political  intelligence 
of  the  masses,  and  too  ready  to  concur  in  the  sweeping 
extension  of  the  suffrage.  For  this,  perhaps,  more 
than  for  anything  else,  we  may  have  to  fear  the  verdict 
of  posterity.  Not  from  us,  however,  but  from  Lord 
John  Russell  and  the  Whigs  came  the  first  proposal 
to  disturb  the  settlement  of  1832.  In  Cobden's  writings 

P  See  Chapter  XX.] 
Q 


226  REMINISCENCES 

will  be  found  clear  perception  of  the  danger  of  popular 
ignorance  and  folly,  loyalty  to  government  by  intelli- 
gence, and  freedom  from  sympathy  with  anything 
like  mob  rule.  The  Chartists  were  enemies  to  the 
League.  One  of  the  School,  at  least,  believes  that  he 
can  truly  say  that  he  never  addressed  an  audience  of 
working-men  on  the  subject  without  avowing  his  belief 
that  the  franchise  was  a  trust,  for  which  qualifications 
ought  to  be  required.  It  must  be  remembered,  too, 
that  we  were  for  a  reform  of  the  House  of  Lords,  a 
measure  then  thought  revolutionary,  but  which,  if  it 
could  now  be  carried  in  an  effective  shape,  might  redress 
the  balance  of  the  Constitution.  It  must  further  be 
remembered  that  Bright  and  Cobden  were  sincere,  and 
had  no  selfish  or  party  end  in  view.  They  were  not 
like  the  Whigs  and  Tories,  who  were  bidding  against 
each  other  for  power  by  largesses  of  the  suffrage.  Their 
object  was  not  to  "dish  "  Whigs  or  Tories,  but  to  set 
Parliament  free  from  the  landowning  oligarchy,  by 
which  it  was  still  dominated,  and  to  bring  it  into  unison 
with  the  interest  of  the  whole  nation. 

The  Corn  Law  struggle  unhappily  took  the  shape  of  a 
war  between  two  classes,  the  landowners  and  the  mill- 
owners,  which  was  waged  with  great  bitterness  on  both 
sides,  and  certainly  not  with  the  least  bitterness  on 
the  side  of  the  landowners.  I  am  not  aware  that  either 
Bright  or  Cobden  was  a  strenuous  advocate  of  peasant- 
ownership,  though  they  would  gladly  have  seen  the 
great  estates  of  the  present  aristocracy  broken  up,  and 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  227 

an  end  put  to  the  divorce  of  the  people  from  the  land. 
They  could  hardly  fail  to  see  that  agricultural  England 
was  almost  irreversibly  organized  on  the  principle  of 
large  farms.  But  they  did,  in  the  heat  of  conflict, 
make  somewhat  unmeasured  attacks  on  the  squire 
and  the  manorial  system.  There  was  no  denying, 
however,  that  the  condition  of  the  peasantry  in  those 
days  over  large  districts  was  very  wretched  and  dis- 
creditable to  their  masters.  Too  symbolical  of  it  was 
the  pair  of  trousers  belonging  to  a  Dorsetshire  peasant 
exhibited  in  the  Free  Trade  Hall  at  Manchester,  which 
stood  upright  with  grease  and  patches.  The  landlord's 
pretence  that  he  was  defending  the  labourer  against 
Free  Trade  could  not  possibly  be  treated  with  respect. 
The  weak  point  in  the  manorial  system  is  that  it  de- 
pends on  the  willingness  of  a  rich  man  to  do  unforced 
duty.  In  anything  like  a  malignant  and  fanatical 
attack  on  the  landed  gentry  as  a  class,  or  an  attempt 
to  use  taxation  as  an  instrument  for  their  ruin,  I  do 
not  believe  that  Bright  or  Cobden  would  for  a  moment 
have  thought  of  taking  part. 

To  the  character  of  our  leaders  I  think  we  may  point 
with  reasonable  pride.  They  had  their  failings,  no 
doubt,  but  in  the  main  they  were  actuated  through 
their  whole  career,  not  by  ambition  or  self-interest, 
but  by  a  sincere  belief  that  what  they  were  doing  was 
for  the  public  good.  There  is  something  in  this  at 
least  as  noble  as  the  vociferous  patriotism  which  leads 
to  the  prizes  of  ambition.  For  Cobden  a  handsome 


228  REMINISCENCES 

provision  was  made  by  generous  friends,  of  whom 
Mr.  Thomasson l  of  Bolton  was  the  chief.  He  had 
left  his  business  to  give  himself  to  the  cause.  Why  was 
the  tribute  which  he  received  from  gratitude,  and  had 
amply  earned,  less  honourable  than  the  fortune  which 
a  member  of  the  landed  aristocracy  inherits  by  birth? 
The  same  Tory  Press  which  denounced  Cobden  as  a 
mendicant  charged  Bright  as  a  manufacturer  with 
hard  and  rapacious  treatment  of  his  workmen;  Bright 
said  nothing,  but  the  workmen  came  forward,  and  gave 
the  accusers  an  answer  which  silenced  them  forever. 

I  do  not  think  that  either  Bright  or  Cobden  looked 
very  favourably  on  the  trade  unions.  They  were 
master  manufacturers,  and  the  unions,  at  Sheffield 
especially,  showed  their  bad  as  well  as  their  good  side. 
My  own  convictions  as  well  as  my  sympathies  led  me 
to  fight  for  the  unions,  which  seemed  to  me  absolutely 
necessary  if  justice  was  to  be  done  the  artisan  against 
the  united  phalanx  of  employers.  I  received  some 
hard  knocks  in  the  fray.  I  stood  with  the  heartiest 
satisfaction  on  the  platform  of  Joseph  Arch,  who 
behaved  unexceptionably,  never  giving  a  political 
turn  or  that  of  a  social  war  to  his  movement.  For 
the  movement  he  had  heart-rending  cause  in  the  wages 
of  farm  labour  and  the  state  of  the  rural  poor. 

With  the  Socialists  the  Manchester  School  never  had 
anything  in  common,  except  the  most  general  desire 

P  Thomas  Thomasson,  manufacturer  and  political  economist. 
1808-1876.] 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  229 

to  remove  economical  injustice  and  to  promote  the 
good  of  the  whole  people.  Its  motto,  often  repeated 
by  Bright  and  Cobden,  was 

"  All  constraint, 

Except  what  Wisdom  lays  on  evil  men, 
Is  evil." 

It  thought  that  man  having,  after  centuries  of  struggle, 
shaken  himself  free  from  the  paternal  control  of  auto- 
crats or  aristocracy,  and  got  a  chance  of  self-develop- 
ment, ought  to  be  allowed  to  make  what  he  could  of 
that  chance,  and  not  thrust  again  under  a  despotic 
yoke,  even  though  the  despot,  instead  of  being  a  king, 
might  be  a  committee  representing  the  trade  unions. 
It  regarded  the  general  function  of  Government  as 
that  of  protecting,  not  regulating,  the  conduct  of  life. 
"I  would  rather,"  said  Cobden,  "live  in  a  country 
where  this  feeling  in  favour  of  individual  freedom  is 
jealously  cherished  than  be  without  it  in  the  enjoyment 
of  all  the  principles  of  the  French  Constituent  As- 
sembly." The  principle  was  no  doubt  carried  to  excess 
in  the  attitude  of  some  of  the  Manchester  men  towards 
factory  legislation.  Nor  was  their  combat,  in  this  case 
any  more  than  in  that  of  the  Corn  Laws,  untainted 
by  self-interest.  On  the  other  hand,  the  landowners, 
in  pressing  the  Factory  Acts,  were  certainly  actuated 
in  some  measure  by  a  desire  to  retaliate  on  the  land- 
owners for  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws.  Brougham, 
who  had  no  interest  in  manufactures,  was,  on  principle, 
an  opponent  of  the  Factory  Acts.  We  were,  and  the 


230  REMINISCENCES 

survivors  of  us  still  are,  for  liberty.  But  liberty,  in 
our  conception,  was  not  selfish  and  inhuman  isolation. 
No  one  ever  was  a  greater  lover  of  liberty,  or  could 
have  been  less  congenial  to  Socialists,  than  Bright's 
particular  idol  Milton,  who  deliberately  sacrificed  his 
eyesight  to  the  public  service.  Self-help  is  mutual 
help,  because,  constituted  and  related  as  we  are,  we 
all,  at  every  moment  of  our  lives,  stand  in  need  of  each 
other's  aid;  whereas,  under  a  paternal  Government, 
be  it  that  of  an  ordinary  despot  or  of  a  Socialist  com- 
mittee, each  man  will  look  more  to  the  Government  and 
less  to  his  fellows.  What  does  Individualism,  against 
which  there  is  now  such  an  outcry,  mean?  Does  it 
mean  self-exertion  and  self-reliance,  or  does  it  mean 
selfish  isolation?  If  the  latter,  I  repeat,  it  was  never 
preached  by  the  Manchester  School.  Freedom  does 
not  preclude  voluntary  association,  which  may  co-exist 
with  it  to  any  extent;  whereas,  under  the  Socialistic 
system,  voluntary  association  would  be  no  more. 
There  would  be  an  end,  too,  apparently,  of  private 
beneficence.  Some  Socialists  seem  to  go  as  far  as  the 
abolition  of  domestic  ties.  In  Bellamy's  Utopia  *  no 
child  is  to  be  dependent  on  parental  care.  As  to  the 
limits  of  government,  I  am  not  aware  that  the  Man- 
chester School  ever  attempted  exactly  to  fix  them. 
They  must  be  fixed  largely  by  circumstances,  and  by 
the  stage  of  social  progress  at  which  any  community 

[l" Looking  Backward."     Boston  and  New  York:    Houghton 
Mifflin  Co.     1890.1 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  231 

has  arrived.  The  paternal  meddling  of  Peter  the 
Great  may  not  have  been  so  bad  for  the  Russia  of  his 
time,  nor  may  that  of  the  Jesuit  have  been  so  bad  for 
Paraguay.  What  services  Government  should  under- 
take, whether  it  should  own  the  railways  as  well  as 
the  highroads,  and  the  telegraph  as  well  as  the  post; 
whether  it  should  build  in  private  yards  or  in  yards 
of  its  own,  is  not  a  question  of  principle;  nor  am  I 
aware  that  the  Manchester  School  ever  enunciated 
any  dogma  on  the  subject.  It  is  in  the  hands  of  offi- 
cials, let  us  remember,  not  in  those  of  the  community 
at  large,  with  its  collective  wisdom,  that,  under  the 
Socialist  dispensation,  we  should  be.  A  system  of 
State  education,  which  Cobden,  by  the  way,  favoured, 
is  in  the  charge  of  the  Minister  of  Education  and  his 
bureaucratic  subordinates.  However,  let  Government 
do  that  which  the  citizen  cannot  do  for  himself  with 
the  aid  of  voluntary  association,  and  let  it  protect  all 
who  cannot  protect  themselves.  To  say  this,  one  need 
not  be  a  Socialist.  No  man  of  sense  will  object  to  good 
sanitary  regulations  or  to  the  adoption  of  the  necessary 
means  of  enforcing  them,  any  more  than  he  will  rejoice 
in  the  extension  of  official  interference  for  its  own  sake, 
or  in  the  growth  of  an  army  of  inspectors.  Nor  does 
even  a  limitation  of  the  hours  of  adult  labour,  as  a 
measure  of  public  health,  whether  it  be  wise  or  unwise, 
violate  the  general  principle  of  freedom  of  contract, 
or  answer  to  the  aspirations  of  the  Socialist  who  wishes 
to  put  the  State  in  the  place  of  the  capitalist,  and  make 


232  REMINISCENCES 

it  the  employer  of  labour.  But  when  we  are  told  that 
an  entity  called  the  State  has  rights  transcending 
those  of  the  individual  citizen,  and  that  it  is  the  State's 
duty  to  regulate  our  industries  and  lives,  the  answer 
is  that  the  State,  if  it  means  anything  but  the  Govern- 
ment, is  a  mere  abstraction,  which  can  have  no  rights 
or  duties  of  any  kind. 

In  property,  again,  the  Manchester  School,  like 
everybody  but  Proudhon  in  those  days,  believed.  We 
believed  in  it  as  the  only  known  motive  power  of  pro- 
duction, and  at  the  same  time  the  foundation  of  domes- 
tic life.  We  wished  to  do  away  with  such  a  privilege 
as  the  power  of  entail ;  but  we  thought  that  all  a  man's 
honest  earnings,  whether  great  or  small,  were  his  own, 
and  that  this,  being  the  only  incentive  to  earning  and 
saving,  was  for  the  good  of  the  community  as  well  as 
for  that  of  the  individual  man,  unless  a  race  of  men 
could  be  found  willing  to  work,  not  for  themselves  and 
their  families,  but  for  the  community  at  large.  We 
should  have  gone  heartily  with  any  one  who  sought 
to  regulate  taxation  so  that  as  little  of  the  burden  as 
possible  should  fall  upon  the  poor;  though  we  should 
not  have  gone  with  any  one  who  wished  to  use  the  tax- 
ing power  for  the  purpose  of  demagogic  confiscation. 
We  were  never,  I  believe,  for  the  spoliation  of  the  few 
by  the  many,  any  more  than  for  that  of  the  many  by 
the  few.  By  Cobden,  in  his  controversy  with  Delane,1 
anything  like  agrarian  rapine  was  indignantly  dis- 

I1  John  Thadeus  Delane,  editor  of  The  Times.     This  was  in  1863.] 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  233 

claimed.  Peace  and  economy,  we  hoped,  would  afford 
fiscal  relief  to  all,  and  especially  to  the  working-classes ; 
while  the  increase  of  wages,  arising  from  Free  Trade 
and  its  consequences,  was  at  any  rate  a  larger  measure 
of  upward  levelling  than  any  which  Socialism  with  its 
ateliers  nationaux  has  yet  achieved. 

The  hopes  of  the  Manchester  School  were  limited  to 
gradual  improvement.  The  last  millennium  in  his- 
tory, which  was  that  of  French  fraternity,  had  covered 
the  century  with  its  wreck.  It  may  be  that  a  new  era 
is  now  opening,  and  that  the  social  organism  is  at  last 
to  be,  not  improved  only,  but  transformed.  Socialists, 
however,  have  not  yet  told  us  what  their  scheme  of  a 
reconstituted  society  is,  or  how  they  propose  to  put  it 
in  execution.  They  must  bear  in  mind  that  for  the 
construction  of  the  new  edifice  they  have  only  those 
human  materials  which  they  have  already  condemned 
as  full  of  prejudice,  selfishness,  and  the  evil  traditions 
of  property  and  competition.  At  present,  we  have 
nothing  before  us  but  most  general  principles  or  senti- 
ments, sometimes  embodied  in  Utopian  visions  of  fic- 
titious characters  who  wake  from  a  magic  sleep  or 
pass  through  some  fissure  of  the  earth  into  a  social  and 
material  paradise  free  from  cupidity,  from  competition, 
from  pecuniary  transactions,  and  almost  from  disease 
and  death.  Meanwhile,  the  wage-earning  classes 
through  Europe,  the  mechanics  especially,  are  imbibing 
and  proceeding  to  act  upon  a  very  practical  Socialism 
of  their  own.  They  are  learning  that  instead  of  im- 


234  REMINISCENCES 

proving  their  lot  by  frugality,  temperance,  and  faithful 
industry,  it  will  be  easier  and  more  pleasant  to  use 
their  political  power  in  transferring  the  property  of 
the  other  classes  to  themselves.  In  almost  all  countries 
governed  by  popular  vote  a  reign  of  legislative  confis- 
cation seems  to  be  setting  in,  and  demagogues  are 
beginning  to  vie  with  each  other  in  the  purchase  of 
votes  by  largesses  of  public  money  —  that  is,  the 
money  of  all  except  the  politically  favoured  class. 
Labour  is  in  danger  of  being  demoralized,  and  unless 
the  owners  of  property  are  willing  to  be  plundered 
without  limit,  they  will  presently  turn  to  bay,  and 
there  will  be  social  war,  in  which  the  victory  of  the 
demagogues  and  masses  is  not  assured.  If  the  trans- 
formation of  society  is  to  take  place  through  the  rival 
action  of  political  parties  bidding  against  each  other 
for  power,  the  crash  is  not  far  off. 

I  cannot  help,  in  conclusion,  protesting  that  nothing 
can  be  more  unjust  than  to  charge  Bright  and  his 
associates  with  apostasy  because  they  refused  to  turn 
round  with  Mr.  Gladstone  on  the  Irish  Question.  They 
had  all  along  been  hearty  friends  to  justice  for  Ireland, 
heartier  friends,  if  practical  effort  is  to  be  the  measure, 
than  the  Irish  Members  of  Parliament  themselves. 
They  had  strenuously  pleaded  for  the  disestablishment 
of  the  State  Church  in  Ireland,  for  the  reform  of  the 
Irish  land  system,  for  the  payment  of  the  tenants  for 
improvements,  for  the  abolition  of  primogeniture, 
for  every  righteous  measure  that  could  help  the  people 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  235 

to  the  possession  of  land,  though  not  for  the  subversion 
of  the  faith  of  contracts,  or  for  the  spoliation  of  pro- 
prietors. They  had  done  this  long  before  the  conver- 
sion of  Mr.  Gladstone  to  the  policy  which  he  himself 
denounced  as  that  of  "  dismemberment  and  rapine." 
They  had  always  been  favourable  in  a  general  way  to 
the  extension  of  local  self-government.  But  not  one 
of  them,  I  believe,  had  ever  committed  himself  to  Home 
Rule  or  disunion  in  any  form.  Cobden  shrank  from 
alliance,  almost  from  contact,  with  O'Connell,  and  in 
answer  to  the  advocates  of  Repeal,  said  that  the  real 
source  of  evil  was  in  the  character  of  the  Irish  Members 
of  Parliament,  which  he  thought  would  not  be  improved 
by  transferring  them  from  Westminster  to  Dublin. 

I  was  myself  supposed  at  the  time  to  have  truly 
reflected  the  sentiments  of  my  friends  in  a  work  on 
"Irish  History  and  Irish  Character."1  Much  of  the 
historical  part  of  that  book  has  required  and  undergone 
modification  in  the  light  of  subsequent  research.  But 
in  its  practical  conclusions  it  is  Unionist  and  as  much 
opposed  to  Mr.  Gladstone's  measure  of  Home  Rule  as 
anything  I  could  write  now.  A  man  must  surely  be 
steeped  in  party  spirit  if  he  can  persuade  himself  that 
we  were  all  bound  at  Mr.  Gladstone's  bidding  to  change 
in  a  day  the  opinions  of  our  lives,  not  only  about  Irish 
policy,  but  about  Irish  history,  and  to  join  him  in  de- 
nouncing as  a  monstrous  crime  what  he  himself  lauded 

P"  Irish  History  and  Irish  Character."  By  Goldwin  Smith. 
Oxford  and  London  :  J.  H.  and  Jas.  Parker.  1862.] 


236  REMINISCENCES 

as  the  great  work  of  Pitt.  Was  it  supposed  that  we 
could  shut  our  eyes  to  the  circumstances  under  which 
Mr.  Gladstone's  sudden  conversion  to  Home  Rule 
took  place  ?  Were  we  bound  to  go  with  him  in  reviving 
the  hideous  memories  and  rekindling  the  hateful  pas- 
sions of  a  war  of  Irish  races,  in  setting  the  masses  against 
the  classes,  and  ignorance  against  intelligence,  in  reviv- 
ing dead  jealousies  and  antipathies  among  the  different 
sections  of  the  United  Kingdom  —  all  for  the  purpose 
of  forcing  on  the  nation  a  policy  in  which  we  had  never 
believed,  and  which  the  nation,  if  the  issue  could  be 
clearly  tendered  to  it,  free  from  irrelevant  subjects  of 
agitation,  would  manifestly  condemn?  We  had  never 
bound  ourselves  to  Mr.  Gladstone's  leadership.  We 
rejoiced,  of  course,  when  he  gradually  came  over  to  us 
and  carried  Liberal  measures,  such  as  University  Re- 
form and  Irish  Disestablishment,  which  he  had  once 
opposed.  We  rejoiced  when  the  most  distinguished 
member  of  the  Government  which  made  the  Crimean 
War,  not  only  abandoned,  but  denounced,  Protectorate 
of  Turkey.  On  the  British  question  of  Free  Trade 
Mr.  Gladstone  was  always  with  us,  and  we  knew  how 
to  value  his  support.  Still,  there  were  points  of  dif- 
ference. Mr.  Gladstone  seemed  to  be  unchangeably 
committed  to  the  principle  of  English  Church  Establish- 
ment. He  seemed  also  strongly  attached  to  hereditary- 
institutions,  and  we  hardly  knew  of  which  party  he 
would  have  become  the  leader  if  Disraeli  had  been  out 
of  the  way.  Bright  left  Mr.  Gladstone's  Government 


THE  MANCHESTER  SCHOOL  237 

on  the  Egyptian  Question,  and,  as  I  have  said,  I  know 
that  he  felt  strongly  about  it,  though  he  was  too  chiv- 
alrous to  attack  in  public  the  Government  of  which 
he  had  been  a  member.  Our  chiefs  had  preserved 
perfect  independence,  and  when  we  went  with  the  sur- 
vivor of  them  on  the  Irish  Question,  we  were  being  true 
to  personal  connection  as  well  as  to  public  principles. 

Society,  as  was  said  before,  may  be  at  the  opening 
of  a  new  era  and  on  the  eve  of  a  complete  reconstruction. 
Even  in  that  case  it  may  be  hoped  that  the  champions 
of  Free  Trade,  retrenchment,  religious  equality,  peace, 
and  "a  government  squared  to  the  maxims  of  common 
sense  and  a  plain  morality,"  will  be  held  to  have  done 
not  badly  in  their  brief  day.  How  it  will  fare  with  our 
belief  in  liberty  and  property  remains  to  be  seen.  If 
coercion  and  confiscation  gain  the  day  and  make  the 
world  happy,  our  principles  will  lie  forever  in  the  grave 
of  extinct  superstitions.  Otherwise,  Resurgemus. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN 

Bright's  Oratory  —  Cobden  —  His  politics  —  Peel  —  Disraeli — Peel 
as  a  Party  Leader. 

LIBERALISM — colonial,  economical,  an  general — had 
early  connected  me  with  Bright  and  Cobden;  but  the 
tie  was  rendered  much  closer  by  sympathy  and  joint 
action  at  the  time  of  the  war  in  America  between  North 
and  South. 

Few  would  hesitate  to  give  John  Bright  the  foremost 
place  among  the  British  orators  of  his  day.  The  ques- 
tion whether  his  speeches  were  prepared  has  been  de- 
bated. But  there  can  be  no  doubt  upon  the  point.  I 
have  stood  by  him  when  he  was  speaking  and  seen  the 
little  sheaf  of  notepapers  on  each  of  which  probably  his 
sentence  or  his  catchword  was  written  and  which 
dropped  into  his  hat  as  he  went  on.  Nobody  can  speak 
literature  ex  tempore,  and  Bright's  great  speeches  are 
literature,  first-rate  of  its  kind.  He  was,  however,  by 
no  means  without  the  power  of  speaking  ex  tempore. 
I  have  known  him  when  called  on  unexpectedly  respond 
very  well.  If  he  was  interrupted  by  an  opponent  in  his 
speech,  he  was  ready  with  his  retort.  He  told  me  that 
when  he  was  to  speak  at  the  unveiling  of  Cobden's 

238 


BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN  239 

Statue  at  Bradford  he  had  been  greatly  at  a  loss  as  to 
what  he  should  say ;  but  the  happy  thought  had  come  to 
him  one  morning  while  he  was  dressing.  He  had  begun 
as  a  temperance  lecturer  with  a  single  address.  He  had 
no  doubt  formed  his  style  on  the  Bible,  which  I  never 
heard  read  so  well  as  when  I  heard  him  read  it  to  his 
household.  His  delivery  was  calm  and  impressive, 
witKouf  gesticulation  or  appearance  of  oratorical  pas- 
sion. His  enunciation  was  perfectly  distinct,  and  he 
thus  without  straining  his  voice  made  himself  heard  in 
the  largest  hall.  He  confessed  to  me  that  after  all  his 
practice  and  success  he  never  got  over  his  nervousness. 
At  Bradford,  where  his  audience  was  more  than  friendly, 
he  told  me  that  his  knees  shook  under  him  when  he  rose 
to  speak. 

An  orator,  however  perfect  in  his  art,  can  hardly  be 
impressive  without  weight  and  dignity  of  character. 
These  John  Bright  had  in  a  high  degree.  Nobody  could 
doubt  his  sincerity  or  the  depth  of  his  convictions. 
Though  he  was  combative  and  they  caricatured  him  as 
the  fighting  Quaker,  he  never  lost  his  balance.  He 
gave  remarkable  proofs  of  greatness  of  mind.  He  long 
bore  in  silence  slanderous  reports  about  his  treatment 
of  his  work-people,  and  when  the  denial  came  it  was  not 
from  him,  but  from  the  work-people  themselves.  When 
he  was  opposing  the  Crimean  War  and  I  told  him  in 
jest  that  his  life  was  threatened  by  the  Jingoes,  his 
reply  was  that  a  man  might  come  to  a  worse  end.  Nor 
did  he  ever  betray  selfish  ambition  or  pique.  When  he 


240  REMINISCENCES 

left  Gladstone's  Ministry  on  account  of  its  invasion  of 
Egypt,1  though  in  private  he  spoke  very  warmly  on  the 
subject,  he  was  too  chivalrous  to  say  in  public  anything 
which  could  embarrass  his  late  colleagues. 

Oratory  was  his  sphere.  For  business  he  had  not 
much  aptitude.  I  understood  that  as  Chancellor  of 
the  Duchy  of  Lancaster  he  was  very  little  at  his  office. 
In  truth,  I  should  think  that  he  was  by  nature  rather 
indolent  and  required  strong  stimulus,  such  as  the  Corn 
Law  agitation,  to  make  him  put  forth  his  powers.  In 
his  face  there  is  a  certain  likeness  to  Pym.  Butln 
Pym's  face  you  see  the  man  of  action ;  in  that  of  Bright 

iBjMia-r^^i rrmarm — ra"n~^ -— — — —  •      "  ••«  «»-«->*^--^-J~— -••••••-••^•|T|-^T»-n|rrir--J- 

you  did  not. 

Bright  probably  did  not  read  much  beyond  the  mate- 
rials of  his  speeches.  He  was,  however,  fond  of  sono- 
rous poetry,  and  once  read  aloud  to  me  with  great  gusto 
a  sonorous  passage  from  the  "Epic  of  Hades."  2  Of 
Milton  he  was  very  fond,  both  on  poetical  and  political 
grounds.  He  asked  me  whom  I  thought  the  greatest  of 
Englishmen,  and  answered  his  own  question  by  naming 
Milton,  because  Milton  was  so  great  at  once  as  a  man  of 
letters  and  as  a  citizen.  On  his  seventieth  birthday, 
when  his  friends  were  sending  him  presents,  I  got  a  copy 
of  the  Baskerville  "Milton"  printed  at  Birmingham, 
for  which  Bright  was  then  Member,  and  wrote  his  own 
words  on  the  fly-leaf. 

He  had  doffed  the  Quaker  dress  and  given  up  the 
Quaker  dialect ;  but  if  you  had  said  anything  disparag- 
f1  In  1882.]  [*  By  Lewis  Morris.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  241 

ing  of  Quakerism  before  him,  you  would  soon  have 
found  that  he  had  not  renounced  his  faith.  One  of  the 
last  conversations  which  I  had  with  him  was  about  the 
religious  difficulties  of  our  time.  He  seemed  to  think 
that  Quakerism  or  something  like  it  was  the  true 
solution;  and  that  we  had_only  to  get  rid  of  forms  AU/" 
which  interfered  with  the  freedom  of  our  spiritual 
life. 

Bright  never  was  revolutionary  or  desirous  of  over- 
turning any  Government  which  he  believed  would  do 
justice  to  the  people.  It  was  the  class  character  of  the 
aristocratic  and  landlord  Government  that  provoked 
his  enmity.  In  the  last  years  of  his  life  when  the  com- 
mercial battle  between  the  New  England  of  the  North 
and  the  Old  England  of  the  South  was  over,  he  softened 
very  much  towards  old  institutions,  as  old  institutions 
did  toward  him.  As  he  sat  on  my  lawn  at  Oxford  one 
summer  afternoon  when  the  music  of  bells  was  floating 
from  the  ancient  city,  I  overheard  him  say,  "It  would  be 
very  pleasant  to  be  eighteen  and  to  be  coming  here." 

At  a  critical  moment  of  the  Home  Rule  agitation 
there  was  a  dinner  party  of  three  at  the  house  of  Lord 
Selborne  at  which  the  Irish  question  was  discussed.  If 
Bright's  opinion  had  not  been  fixed  before,  I  think  it  was 
fixed  then.  What  may  safely  be  said  is  that  he  had  the 
good  of  Ireland  as  much  as  that  of  England  in  view. 
His  wisdom  told  him  where  it  lay.  He  was  utterly 
incapable  of  sacrificing  justice  or  the  real  interest  of  any 
people  to  British  or  Imperial  dominion. 


242  REMINISCENCES 

1  Cobden  too,  I  had  the  happiness  of  knowing  well, 
and  I  can  bear  witness  to  the  truth  of  Mr.  Morley's 
portrait  of  him.  A  man  more  transparently  honest, 
more  single-minded,  more  truthful,  more  entirely 
devoid  of  selfish  ambition  and  of  selfishness  of  every 
kind,  more  absolutely  devoted  to  the  service  of  his 
country  and  of  humanity,  never,  I  should  think,  ap- 
peared in  public  life.  The  persuasiveness  of  his  elo- 
quence was  simply  the  result  of  his  character.  In 
rhetoric  he  was  not  great.  His  kindness  of  heart,  his 
charity,  his  candour,  had  remained  unimpaired  by  all 
his  battles.  Wrong  and  oppression  he  hated  with  all 
his  soul :  but  he  had  no  enmities,  any  more  than  he  had 
rivalries.  His  nature  was  entirely  sweet  and  sound. 

He  was  no  bagman,  though  his  enemies  called  him  so, 
and  he  freely  called  himself  so  in  jest.  He  had  not  re- 
ceived a  good  education  at  school,  but  he  had  educated 
—  and  not  only  educated,  but  cultivated  —  his  intellect 
in  gratifying  his  boundless  love  of  knowledge.  He  had 
explored  and  studied  Europe,  economical,  social,  and 
political,  with  a  curious  eye  and  a  comprehensive  mind. 
He  was  acute  and  exact  in  observing  the  connection  of 
the  different  influences  which  form  national  character 
with  each  other,  and  was  a  true  social  philosopher, 
though  without  a  formal  system.  His  insight  into 
political  character  and  tendency  was  very  keen.  In 
1849  he  foresaw  the  Tory  Suffrage  Bill  of  1867. 

p  What  follows,  down  to  page  271,  appeared  in  The  Nineteenth 
Century  for  June,  1888.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  243 

"May  I  predict  that,  if  we  should  succeed  to  the  extent 
above  named,  there  would  not  be  wanting  shrewd  mem- 
bers of  the  Tory  aristocracy  who  would  be  found 
advocating  universal  suffrage  to  take  their  chance  in  an 
appeal  to  the  ignorance  and  vice  of  the  country  against 
the  opinions  of  the  teetotallers,  Nonconformists,  and 
rational  Radicals,  who  would  constitute  nine-tenths 
of  our  phalanx  of  forty-shilling  freeholders."  Nor 
was  he  without  literary  or  even  without  classical  inter- 
ests, notwithstanding  his  rather  economical  sayings 
about  the  scanty  waters  of  the  Ilissus,  and  the  terri- 
torial insignificance  of  the  scenes  of  Greek  history.  He 
would  talk,  and  talk  well,  about  Greek  oratory  and  the 
Greek  drama,  which  he  had  explored  as  well  as  he  could 
through  translations.  He  was  apparently  a  little  dis- 
appointed by  the  absence  of  passionate  rhetoric  in 
Demosthenes.  Cobden's  style  is  excellent  for  its  pur- 
pose, which  is  that  of  the  pamphleteer.  Cobden's 
favourite  poet  was  Cowper,  who  touched  him  morally. 
For  poetry  of  the  deeper  and  more  philosophic  kind,  he 
probably  did  not  much  care.  But  he  had  an  eye  and  a 
heart  for  nature.  On  the  whole  it  may  pretty  safely 
be  said,  that  among  all  those  who  affected  scorn  of 
Cobden's  vulgarity  and  narrowness,  there  would  prob- 
ably not  have  been  found  so  rich  or  so  comprehensive 
a  mind. 

In  a  striking  passage  quoted  by  Mr.  Morley,1  Cobden 

P  "Life   of   Richard   Cobden."     London:    Chapman  and  Hall. 
1881.     Volume  I,  pages  200-202.] 


244  REMINISCENCES 

says  emphatically,  that  the  basis  of  his  own  character 
was  religious,  that  his  sympathies  were  with  religious 
men,  and  that  it  was  his  "reverence"  that  sustained 
him  through  the  labours  and  struggles  of  his  public  life. 
I  have  no  doubt  that  he  spoke  the  truth.  He  was  not 
in  the  least  sectarian;  he  was  a  devout  believer  in 
phrenology,  the  crude  precursor  of  scientific  rational- 
ism; but  he  certainly  was  religious,  and  always  felt 
that  in  bravely  doing  his  duty,  in  upholding  righteous- 
ness, in  labouring  for  the  good  of  his  kind,  he  was  in  the 
hand  of  God. 

This  man  was  not  an  un-English  man,  but,  on  the 
contrary,  the  truest  and  heartiest  of  patriots.  Na- 
tional swagger  he  hated  as  well  as  national  injustice; 
but  the  pages  of  his  life  show  that  he  was  as  proud 
as  any  swaggerer  of  the  high  qualities  and  the  great 
achievements  of  his  countrymen,  while  he  had  a  large- 
minded  and  generous  appreciation  of  the  special  excel- 
lences and  advantages  of  other  nations.  England,  as 
represented  by  him,  was  a  gentleman,  and  not  a  bully. 
He  desired  for  his  country  the  leadership  of  interna- 
tional morality,  and  he  believed  that  her  real  interest 
was  bound  up  with  the  interest  of  humanity;  but  he  did 
not  disregard  her  interest ;  on  the  contrary,  he  always 
looked  to  it  first,  and  never  without  distinct  reference 
to  it  proposed  any  plan  of  cosmopolitan  improvement. 
If  he  advocated  and  encouraged  a  friend  to  advocate 
colonial  emancipation,  it  was  not  because  either  of  them 
wished  to  deprive  their  country  of  anything  that  could 


BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN 


245 


bring  her  wealth  or  strength,  but  because  both  of  them 
were  convinced  that  these  distant  dependencies  brought 
neither  wealth  nor  strength,  but,  on  the  contrary,  loss 
of  money  and  weakness;  that,  in  a  military  point  of 
view,  they  entailed  a  forfeiture  of  the  advantages  of  an 
insular  position;  and  that  the  only  bond  which  could 
permanently  and  usefully  unite  England  to  free  colonies 
was  the  bond  of  the  heart.  He  certainly  looked  forward 
to  the  ultimate  junction  of  Canada  with  the  United 
States,  and  the  union  of  the  whole  English-speaking  race 
on  the  American  continent;  but  he  expected  this  to 
take  place  with  the  consent  of  the  Mother-country,  and 
believed  that  it  would  be  greatly  to  her  advantage. 

Cobden  had  no  sympathy  with  Repeal.  His  policy 
for  Ireland  was  the  abolition  of  the  feudal  land  law, 
which  fosters  great  estates  and,  in  the  case  of  Ireland, 
absenteeism.  The  feudal  law  ought  indeed  to  have 
been  abolished,  by  the  abrogation  of  primogeniture  and 
entail,  before  entering  on  a  course  of  more  violent  and 
equivocal  legislation. 

Mr.  Kinglake  says  that  Cobden  and  his  great  asso- 
ciate had  no  chance  of  getting  a  hearing  when  they 
strove  to  keep  the  peace  with  Russia,  because,  as  they 
had  declared  against  war  in  general,  it  was  impossible 
that  they  should  command  attention  when  they  spoke 
against  any  particular  war.1  Mr.  Morley  replies  2  with 

I1  See  "The  Invasion  of  the  Crimea :  its  Origin,  and  an  Account 
of  its  Progress  down  to  the  Death  of  Lord  Raglan."  By  Alexander 
William  Kinglake.  Volume  I,  pages  270  et  seq.  New  York: 
Harper.  1880.  Volume  II,  pages  69-71  of  the  English  edition.] 

[2  "Life  of  Richard  Cobden."     Volume  II,  pages  157  et  seq.] 


246  REMINISCENCES 

truth  that  Cobden  had  not  declared  against  war  in  gen- 
eral. But  he  had  attended  Peace  Conferences,  the  ob- 
ject of  which  was  to  denounce  all  war.  A  demonstra- 
tion for  or  against  a  definite  measure  or  course  of  policy, 
such  as  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws  or  the  support  of 
the  Ottoman  dominion,  is  often  useful ;  but  a  demon- 
stration in  favour  of  a  general  principle  always  seems 
to  commit,  and  usually  does  in  fact  commit,  those  who 
take  part  in  it  to  an  indiscriminate  application.  Cob- 
den's  authority  on  questions  of  peace  and  war  was 
weakened  in  this  way. 

Hardly  any  mind  can  escape  the  bias  of  its  history ; 
Cobden's  had  no  doubt  contracted  a  bias,  and  a  serious 
one,  from  the  Free  Trade  struggle.  Absolutely  free 
from  any  sordid  sentiment,  from  any  disposition  to  be- 
lieve that  man  lives  by  bread  alone,  from  any  conscious 
preference  of  material  over  moral  and  political  con- 
sideration, he  yet  was  inclined  to  overrate  the  be- 
neficent power  of  commercial  influences,  and  conse- 
quently the  value  of  commercial  objects.  This  was 
seen  at  the  beginning  of  the  war  between  the  free  and 
slave  States  in  America,  when,  though  his  heart  was  as 
thoroughly  on  the  side  of  political  and  industrial  free- 
dom as  that  of  any  human  being  could  be,  he  was  for  a 
time  prevented  from  raising  his  voice  for  the  right,  if 
not  held  in  a  wavering  state  of  mind,  by  his  strong  feel- 
ing in  favour  of  the  Southerners  as  Free  Traders; 
though  he  could  hardly  have  helped  knowing  that  with 
them,  Free  Trade  was  not  an  enlightened  principle,  but 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  247 

the  necessity  of  a  community  incapable  of  manufactur- 
ing for  itself.  The  same  thing  was  seen  again  in  the 
case  of  the  French  Treaty.  Mr.  Morley  is  mistaken  in 
thinking  that  anybody  objected  to  negotiating  with  the 
French  Government  on  account  of  its  character  and 
origin;  we  were  all  ready  to  do  business  with  Nero; 
though  certainly,  if  there  was  a  hand  which  Liberals 
might  be  excused  for  not  wishing  to  take  even  in  the 
course  of  business,  it  was  that  of  Louis  Napoleon.  The 
objection  which  some  of  us  felt  was  to  abetting  the  Em- 
peror in  an  arbitrary  use  of  his  treaty-making  power 
for  the  purpose  of  overriding,  on  a  question  of  domestic 
policy,  the  well-known  sentiments  of  his  Legislature  and 
his  people.  We  thus,  for  a  commercial  object,  became 
accomplices  in  Absolutist  encroachment.  There  could 
be  no  mistake  about  the  matter.  The  Emperor  as- 
sured Cobden  that  the  Legislative  Body  was  irrecon- 
cilably hostile  to  every  manner  of  Free  Trade,  and 
Cobden  himself  says  that  it  would  be  impossible  to 
assemble  five  hundred  persons  in  France  by  any  process 
of  selection,  and  not  find  nine-tenths  of  them,  at  least, 
in  favour  of  the  restrictive  system.  An  apprehension, 
which  events  too  well  justified,  was  felt  that  Free  Trade 
itself  would  be  tainted  in  the  mind  of  the  French  people 
by  association  with  the  violence  done  by  a  high-handed 
stretch  of  power  to  national  opinion. 

That  the  good  effects  even  of  commercial  prosperity 
were  neither  unlimited  nor  unmixed,  Cobden  himself 
had  reason  to  observe.  Writing  about  the  rejection  of 


248  REMINISCENCES 

Mr.  Bright  at  Manchester,  he  ascribes  "this  display  of 
snobbishness  and  ingratitude  "  to  the  great  prosperity 
which  Lancashire  enjoys  mainly  through  the  efforts  of 
Mr.  Bright;  and  predicts  that  those  vices  and  the 
political  apostasy  connected  with  them  will  go  on  in  the 
north  of  England  "so  long  as  the  exports  continue  to 
increase  at  the  same  rate."  In  another  letter  he  says 
"the  great  prosperity  of  the  country  made  Tories  of  us 
all ; "  and  accuses  the  middle  class,  which  it  was  hoped 
could  be  independent,  of  having  sunk  into  the  most 
abject  servility  from  the  same  cause.  "I  have  never 
known  a  manufacturing  representative  put  into  a 
cocked-hat  and  breeches  and  ruffles,  with  a  sword  by  his 
side,  to  make  a  speech  for  the  Government,  without  hav- 
ing his  head  turned  by  the  feathers  and  frippery ;  gen- 
erally they  give  way  to  a  paroxysm  of  snobbery,  and  go 
down  on  their  bellies  and  throw  dust  on  their  heads,  and 
fling  dirt  at  the  prominent  men  of  their  own  order." 
Aristocracy  here  conspired  with  the  vast  growth  of 
wealth  which  followed  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws; 
but  it  cannot  be  said  that  the  vast  growth  of  wealth 
had  a  purely  elevating  influence  in  itself.  Another 
fact  might  be  cited  in  support  of  the  same  moral,  though 
Cobden  was  himself  unconscious  of  its  import.  The 
letter  of  the  French  Emperor  declaring  for  Free  Trade 
appeared  upon  a  Sunday,  and  on  the  Tuesday 
following,  as  Mr.  Morley  —  following,  we  presume, 
the  account  given  by  Cobden  —  tells  us,  at  the 
great  market  at  Manchester,  which  used  to  draw 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  249 

men  from  all  parts  of  that  thriving  district,  the 
French  Emperor  was  everywhere  hailed  as  the  best 
man  in  Europe.  He  who  had  not  only  destroyed  the 
liberties  which  he  was  set  to  guard,  but  had  literally 
revelled  in  perjury  and  rioted  in  innocent  blood,  who 
was  not  only  the  greatest  enemy  of  freedom,  but  the 
greatest  felon  in  Europe,  and  who  a  few  years  before 
had  been  denounced  by  the  universal  voice  of  British 
morality,  had  in  a  moment,  to  the  bribed  understand- 
ings and  consciences  of  all  these  respectable  and  reli- 
gious traders,  become  the  best  man  in  Europe  because 
he  had  promised  to  add  something  to  their  gains ! 

It  is  due,  however,  to  Cobden  always  to  mark  that 
he  was  a  Free  Trader  indeed ;  his  heart  was  with  those 
who  proposed  absolutely  to  abolish  all  import  duties, 
and  supply  their  place,  so  far  as  was  necessary,  by  direct 
taxation.  His  desire  and  his  hope  were  to  make 
one  commercial  community  of  the  whole  human  race. 
Thoroughly  embracing  the  principle,  he  was  entitled  to 
reckon  on  the  full  effects  of  its  application.  In  this  he 
differed  essentially  from  those  who,  calling  themselves 
Free  Traders,  are  in  fact  nothing  of  the  kind,  but  merely 
advocates  of  a  particular  tariff,  very  wisely  framed  no 
doubt  with  reference  to  British  industries  and  interests, 
but  not  necessarily  suited  to  those  of  all  the  countries 
in  the  world. 

Peel  I  did  not  know;  but  I  lived  very  much  with 
those  who  knew  him  well.  I  have  also  had  access  to 
information  of  a  documentary  kind  which  helps  to 


250  REMINISCENCES 

explain  some  of  the  doubtful  passages  of  his  long  and 
vexed  career.  When  he  fell  from  power,1 1  was  still  at 
college,  and,  in  common  with  most  of  the  young  Liber- 
als of  the  day,  I  looked  up  with  ardent  sympathy  to  the 
great  statesman  who,  trying  to  rise  above  party  and 
govern  in  the  interest  of  the  nation,  was  struck  down 
by  the  blind  resentment  of  a  selfish  faction  and  by 
the  dagger  of  the  political  bravo. 

Peel  and  Cobden,  after  their  long  strife  and  final 
reconcilement,  were  in  a  way  united  in  their  burials. 
Peel  lies,  not  in  Westminster  Abbey,  but  in  his  home ; 
Cobden  lies  in  a  country  churchyard.  Peel,  by  his  will, 
specially  forbade  his  son  to  accept  a  peerage  on  account 
of  his  father's  services.  Cobden  was  essentially  a 
republican.  There  was  a  touch  of  something  anti- 
aristocratic,  if  not  .  .  . 2 

Peel  has  been  called  the  greatest  Member  of  Parlia- 
ment who  ever  lived.  A  sneer  perhaps  lurks  in  the 
compliment;  but,  apart  from  the  sneer,  the  compli- 
ment belongs  rather  to  Pym  or  to  one  of  the  Pitts.  It 
may  more  truly  be  said  of  Peel  that  he  was  about  the 
best  public  servant  whom  England  ever  had.  No  other 
Minister  ever  was  so  thoroughly  conversant  with  all 
the  interests  and  master  of  all  the  business  of  the 
State.  This  it  was  that  lent  such  weight  to  his 
speeches,  and  gave  him  his  immense  power  over  the 
House  of  Commons.  That,  so  far  as  the  evil  system  of 
party  —  for  the  establishment  of  which  he  was  not 

[!  June  the  27th,  1846.]  [2  Hiatus  in  MS.] 


BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN  251 

responsible  —  would  let  him,  Peel  was  a  true  patriot, 
and  served  his  country  to  the  utmost  of  his  power  and 
with  all  his  heart,  never  sparing  himself,  but  giving  the 
most  conscientious  attention  to  all  the  details  of  the 
public  business,  must  be  the  conviction  of  every  one 
who  really  knows  his  history.  His  great  qualities  were 
rather  those  of  an  administrator  than  those  of  a  legis- 
lator, and  were  liable  to  be  rated  lower  than  they  de- 
served under  the  party  system,  which  counts  only  leg- 
islative triumphs.  In  legislation  he  was  not  an  origina- 
tor, at  least  upon  the  greatest  questions;  but,  as  one 
who  gave  practical  effect  to  the  conclusions  of  the  time, 
his  record  on  the  Statute  Book  is  immense.  When  once 
he  put  his  hand  to  the  work,  he  was  bold,  and  never 
stopped  at  half-measures.  His  bills  were  framed  with 
the  greatest  care,  so  as  to  pass  with  the  least  possible 
amendment.  For  his  memorable  Budgets,  his  financial 
experiments,  the  creation  of  the  fiscal  system  under 
which  England  has  prospered,  he  had  the  assistance  of 
first-rate  coadjutors,  official  and  non-official;  yet  the 
measures  may  fairly  be  said  to  have  been  his  own. 
Irrespective  of  the  party  ties  by  which  in  his  very 
boyhood  he  had  been  tightly  and  almost  inextricably 
bound,  he  was  by  nature  a  Conservative  —  ready  for 
any  practical  reform,  but  averse  from  organic  change. 
Such  is  apt  to  be  the  temperament  of  great  adminis- 
trators, who  are  satisfied  with  their  tools  as  they  are; 
and  it  is  a  better  temperament,  at  all  events,  than  that 
of  politicians  who  seek  power  through  great  convul- 


252  REMINISCENCES 

sions  and  use  it  for  small  jobs.  The  weak  points  of 
Peel's  career  are  his  conversions  on  Catholic  Emanci- 
pation and  the  Corn  Laws,  of  which  nobody  denies 
either  the  sincerity  or  the  necessity,  but  which  involved 
an  appearance  of  infidelity  to  party;  while  the  desper- 
ate awkwardness  of  the  position  in  which,  during  the 
process  of  conversion,  a  leader  is  placed,  between  the 
impossibility  of  keeping  silence  as  a  private  man  whose 
mind  was  wavering  would  do,  and  the  danger  of  pre- 
maturely avowing  conclusions  which  may  shake  the 
State,  has  furnished  malice  with  materials  for  imputa- 
tions of  deceitfulness  of  which  unsparing  use  has  been 
made.  To  these  imputations  Peel  was  too  nervously 
susceptible ;  but  we  have  tried  effrontery,  and  can  tell 
which  has  the  best  effect  on  public  character.  That 
the  intellect  of  the  man  who  was  chiefly  responsible  for 
the  welfare  of  the  people  should  not  upon  such  a  ques- 
tion as  the  Corn  Laws  have  been  allowed  to  act  freely 
for  the  public  good,  and  that  the  country  should  have 
been  compelled  to  deprive  itself  of  the  services  of  its 
great  administrator  because  there  had  been  a  change  in 
national  opinion  upon  an  economical  question,  have 
always  seemed  to  me  heavy  counts  in  the  indictment 
against  the  party  system,  and  that  constitutional  rule 
which  requires  that,  whenever  a  new  light  breaks  upon 
the  mind  of  the  legislative  body,  the  executive  Govern- 
ment shall  be  overturned. 

Factious  things  must,  in  the  course  of  nature,  be 
done  by  every  leader  of  opposition ;  but  no  leader  of 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  253 

opposition  ever  did  fewer  of  them  than  Peel.  He  never 
weakened  or  degraded  Government.  He  played  no 
jockey  tricks.  He  never  descended  to  the  tactics 
familiar  to  those  who  supplanted  him,  of  coalescing  with 
the  extreme  section  of  the  other  party  for  the  purpose 
of  upsetting  the  Ministry.  He  would  have  spurned 
such  a  suggestion  as  the  utter  betrayal  of  all  the  ob- 
sects  for  which  his  party  existed,  as  the  depth  at  once 
of  folly  and  dishonour.  Never  did  he  give  his  followers 
the  signal  to  turn  round  and  vote  against  the  second 
reading  of  a  bill  when  they  had  voted  in  favour  of  the 
first  reading  because  it  appeared  that  advantage  might 
be  taken  of  a  division  in  the  ranks  of  the  Government. 
Never  did  he  on  a  great  measure  belie  his  recorded  con- 
victions and  trifle  with  the  political  life  of  the  nation 
for  the  purpose  of  " dishing"  his  rivals.  He  avoided 
rather  than  sought  faction  fights ;  held  back  his  follow- 
ers as  much  as  he  could  from  premature  attacks ;  never 
attempted  to  filch  office,  but  waited  till  his  time  was 
fully  come,  and,  instead  of  climbing  over  the  wall,  he 
could  enter  by  the  great  gate.  In  time  of  public  peril 
he  knew  that  party  feeling  and  personal  ambition  must 
be  restrained. 

A  man  of  genius  Peel  cannot  be  called.  He  was  not 
imaginative  or  creative ;  even  in  appreciation  his  mind, 
open  as  it  was,  moved  slowly.  It  moved  slowly  in  all 
things ;  and,  like  Burghley,1  he  used  his  pen  a  good  deal 
in  the  process  of  deliberation.  Nor  did  he  always  see 

I1  Queen  Elizabeth's  great  Chief  Minister.    1520-1598.] 


254  REMINISCENCES 

the  limits  of  a  principle;  if  he  had,  perhaps  he  would 
have  perceived  more  clearly  and  maintained  more  firmly 
that  the  principle  of  free  competition,  however  sound  as 
applied  to  commerce  in  general,  was  hardly  sound  when 
applied  to  national  works  like  railways.  Still,  in  the 
construction  of  the  Conservative  party,  and  in  placing 
it  exactly  on  the  right  basis  after  the  great  change  of 
1832,  his  practical  sagacity  did  the  work  of  genius. 
His  moderation  in  resistance  lent  no  pretext  for  violence 
to  the  progressists,  and  perhaps  perverted *  revolution. 
He  was  greatly  helped  in  this  by  his  commercial  origin 
and  his  affinity  to  the  middle  class.  The  same  influ- 
ences were  always  drawing  him  towards  alliance  with 
such  a  man  as  Cobden,  wide  as  the  gulf  between  them 
might  appear. 

In  one  respect  he  stands  almost  by  himself.  It 
would  be  difficult  at  least  to  name  any  leader  who  had 
left  the  country  such  a  bequest  of  statesmen.  In 
drawing  young  men  to  him  he  had  to  get  over  the  diffi- 
culties of  his  extreme  shyness,  and  of  a  manner  at  first 
icy,  though  Lord  Aberdeen  said  of  him  that  when  he 
did  open  himself  he  was  the  most,  confiding  of  mankind. 
He  had  also  to  get  over  a  certain  formality  of  judgment 
and  want  of  sympathy  with  anything  eccentric  or 
sentimental,  natural  to  him,  no  doubt,  but  confirmed 
by  the  habits  of  a  life  spent  in  business  of  State,  with 
little  time  for  reading,  intellectual  intercourse,  or  specu- 
lation of  any  kind.  From  the  personal  jealousy  which 
I1  Query.  —  Prevented  ?  or  averted  ?] 


BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN  255 

sometimes  narrows  the  choice  of  associates  he  was  free, 
as  he  showed  by  the  eagerness  with  which  he  welcomed 
to  his  side  Stanley,1  in  whose  unquiet  ambition  and  aris- 
tocratic arrogance  his  sagacity  could  hardly  fail  to  see 
the  probable  source  of  trouble  to  himself.  The  shade 
of  Peel  may  proudly  ask  what  those  who  charged  him 
with  want  of  sympathy  with  genius  have  left  to  eclipse 
his  staff.  In  one  instance  he  has  been  accused  —  and 
will,  no  doubt,  be  accused  again  —  of  a  fatal  oversight. 
But  the  accusers  must  remember  that  the  Disraeli  of 
1841  was  not  the  Lord  Beaconsfield  of  a  later  time. 
The  Disraeli  of  1841  had  announced  himself  under  the 
name  of  Vivian  Grey  as  an  unscrupulous  adventurer, 
bent  on  gratifying  his  ambition,  not  by  the  qualities 
which  Peel  valued  in  a  public  servant,  but  by  skill  in 
intrigue ;  he  had  verified  that  announcement  by  seeking 
election  to  Parliament,  first  as  a  Radical,  and  immedi- 
ately afterwards  as  a  Tory ;  and  he  had  been  denounced 
for  so  doing  by  public  men  whose  confidence  and  whose 
names  he  had,  as  they  thought,  abused.  He  had  sig- 
nified the  intention  which,  in  the  case  of  Lord  Derby, 
he,  with  incomparable  skill  and  knowledge  of  character, 
carried  into  effect,  of  using  his  political  leader  as  a 
Marquis  of  Carabas.2  He  had  presented  himself  to  the 
House  of  Commons  in  raiment  which,  though  symboli- 
cal by  its  gorgeousness  of  a  dazzling  policy,  was  not 

t1  Afterwards  fourteenth  Earl  of  Derby.  He  was  Colonial  Sec- 
retary under  Peel  from  1841  to  1844.] 

P  The  Marquis  of  Carabas  in  Disraeli's  "Vivian  Grey"  is,  I 
believe,  intended  for  the  Marquis  of  Clanricarde.] 


256  REMINISCENCES 

likely  to  fascinate  an  unimaginative  man  of  sense.  He 
had  approached  his  leader,  both  in  public  and  in  private, 
with  fulsome  flattery;  and  fulsome  flattery,  however 
successful  it  might  be  in  other  quarters,  was  not  likely 
to  succeed  with  Peel.  Nor  was  anything  to  be  gained  by 
disparaging  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  in  whom  Peel  did 
not  see  a  rival,  and  whom,  though  little  guided  by  his 
counsels,  he  always  treated  with  the  tenderest  respect. 
After  all,  there  is  a  tradition  that  Peel  —  always  toler- 
ant, though  not  appreciative,  of  the  vagaries  of  talent, 
and  ever  anxious  to  enlist  it  for  the  party  —  wished  to 
give  Disraeli  place,  but  was  prevented  by  the  opposition 
of  Lord  Stanley.  When  his  papers  are  published,  it  will 
be  found,  I  suspect,  that  he  afterwards  treated  Disraeli 
with  a  magnanimity  which  may  be  thought  by  some  to 
have  been  rather  magnanimous  hi  him  than  clearly 
consistent  with  the  public  good.1 

To  do  right  in  the  question  between  Cobden  and  Peel 
while  they  were  in  collision,  we  must  remember  that 
Cobden  was  leading  an  agitation  in  the  interest  of  a 
particular  class.  The  class  was  large,  and  its  interest 
on  this  occasion  coincided  with  that  of  the  community, 
otherwise  it  could  not  have  had  Cobden  and  Bright  for 
spokesmen ;  but  still  it  was  a  class.  With  Cobden  and 
Bright  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Law  was  part  of  a  general 
policy  of  Free  Trade,  and  Free  Trade  itself  was  but  a 
part  of  a  still  more  general  policy  of  peace  and  good-will 

f1  This  was  -written  before  the  publication  of  Volumes  II  and  III 
of  Charles  Stuart  Parker's  Life  of  Peel.  These  appeared  in  1899.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  257 

among  nations,  economy,  and  government  in  the  inter- 
est of  the  people.  But  the  object  of  most  of  the  manu- 
facturers who  were  members  of  the  League  was  simply 
the  repeal  of  a  noxious  impost,  which  specially  pressed 
on  their  own  industry.  They  were  not  universal  philan- 
thropists; they  were  hardly  even  Free  Traders  in  the 
full  sense  of  the  term.  Their  subscriptions  to  the 
League  Fund  were  what  Cobden  himself  called  them,  in- 
vestments, which  they  expected  to  be  repaid  to  them, 
and  which  were  in  fact  repaid  to  them  a  hundred  fold. 
Had  the  same  men  been  landowners,  they  would  prob- 
ably have  been  Protectionists.  To  the  general  policy  of 
Bright  and  Cobden  their  attachment  was  very  equivo- 
cal, as  the  sequel  showed,  and  as  Cobden  himself  has 
told  us :  — 

"I  am  of  opinion  that  we  have  not  the  same  elements 
in  Lancashire  for  a  Democratic  Reform  movement  as 
we  had  for  Free  Trade.  To  me  the  most  discouraging 
fact  in  our  political  state  is  the  condition  of  the  Lan- 
cashire boroughs,  where,  with  the  exception  of  Man- 
chester, nearly  all  the  municipalities  are  in  the  hands  of 
the  stupidest  Tories  in  England,  and  where  we  can 
hardly  see  our  way  for  an  equal  half-share  of  Liberal 
representation.  We  have  the  labour  of  Hercules  in 
hand  to  abate  the  power  of  the  aristocracy,  and  their 
allies  the  snobs  of  the  towns. 

"  You  hint  at  the  possibility  of  Manchester  taking  me 
in  case  of  poor  Potter's 1  death.  I  don't  think  the  offer 
will  ever  be  made,  but  I  am  quite  sure  that  there  is  no 

I1  Thomas  Bayley  Potter,  politician ;  founder  of  the  Cobden 
Club.  1817-1898.] 


258  REMINISCENCES 

demonstration  of  the  kind  that  could  induce  me  (apart 
from  my  determination  not  at  present  to  stand  for  any 
place)  to  put  myself  in  the  hands  of  the  people  who, 
without  more  cause  then  than  now,  struck  down  men 
whose  politics  are  identically  my  own.  To  confess  my 
honest  belief,  I  regard  the  Manchester  constituency, 
now  that  their  gross  pocket  question  is  settled,  as  a  very 
unsound,  and  to  us  a  very  unsafe  body. 

"The  manufacturers  of  Yorkshire  and  Lancashire 
look  upon  India  and  China  as  a  field  of  enterprise,  which 
can  only  be  kept  open  to  them  by  force;  and,  indeed, 
they  are  willing  apparently  to  be  at  all  the  cost  of  hold- 
ing open  the  door  of  the  whole  of  Asia  for  the  rest  of 
the  world  to  trade  on  the  same  terms  as  themselves. 
How  few  of  those  who  fought  for  the  repeal  of  the  Corn 
Law  really  understand  the  full  meaning  of  Free  Trade 
principles ! " 

Men  may  be  named,  besides  Cobden  and  Bright,  who 
did  thoroughly  understand  the  meaning  of  the  principle, 
and  its  connection  with  principles  larger  still ;  but  with 
the  rank  and  file  of  the  movement  Free  Trade  meant 
nothing  but  an  alteration  of  the  tariff  in  their  own 
favour. 

Peel,  on  the  other  hand,  was  the  ruler  of  the  whole 
nation,  and  was  bound  to  consider  not  one  class  or  in- 
terest alone,  but  all.  He  was  also  bound  to  consider 
political  as  well  as  economical  consequences.  The 
aristocracy  personally  he  loved  little,  and  had  little 
cause  to  love ;  it  accepted  his  services  without  ever  for- 
getting that  he  was  by  origin  a  cotton-spinner;  and 
that  he  stood  aloof  from  it  in  heart  was  shown  by  his 
testamentary  injunction  to  his  son.  But  he  believed 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  259 

it  to  be  an  essential  part  of  the  Constitution,  and  he  saw 
plainly  that  its  basis  was  territorial,  or,  in  plain  English, 
that  its  influence  depended  on  its  rents.  It  was  very 
well  for  the  League  to  say  that  the  landowners  would 
not  suffer  by  repeal ;  the  League  cared  little  whether  the 
landowners  suffered  or  not,  and  the  truth  is  that  though 
the  reduction  of  rents  was  suspended  for  a  time  by  the 
enormous  extension  of  the  English  market  for  agricul- 
tural produce  which  followed  the  growth  of  manufac- 
tures, it  has  evidently  come  at  last,  and  seems  likely  to 
bring  its  political  consequences  with  it.  The  predic- 
tion of  evil  to  the  landed  interest,  which  events  appeared 
to  have  belied,  has  been  apparently  fulfilled  after  all; 
for  some  time  past,  at  least,  the  extent  of  English  land 
under  the  plough  has  been  rapidly  decreasing.  There 
was  some  force  also  in  the  military  argument  against 
dependence  on  the  foreigner  for  food;  it  seemed  that 
the  Island  Fortress  would  lose  its  impregnability ;  and 
Peel  could  not  accept,  and  would  have  been  entirely 
misled  if  he  had  accepted,  as  infallibly  true  the  Leaguers' 
assurance  that  Free  Trade  would  be  followed  by  uni- 
versal peace.  Economical  fallacies,  which  experience 
has  now  taught  us  to  deride,  then  fettered  strong  minds ;  r 
nor  would  a  statesman,  when  he  began  to  meditate  the  ' 
great  change,  have  felt  that  he  had  any  great  force  of 
independent  opinion  on  his  side.  The  sudden  conver- 
sion of  the  Whigs,  was,  as  Mr.  Morley  truly  says,  nothing 
more  than  the  device  of  a  foundering  faction.  So  long 
as  they  had  a  secure  tenure  of  power,  and  were  able  to 


260  REMINISCENCES 

control  legislation, they  declared  that  to  meddle  with  the 
Corn  Law  would  be  madness.  They  even,  after  the 
failure  of  their  attempt  "to  set  fire  to  the  house  which 
they  were  leaving,"  showed  rather  faint  attachment  to 
their  new  opinions,  and  their  chiefs  declined  to  vote  for 
for  Mr.  Villiers's  1  annual  motion  2  in  1844.  Peel  had, 
however,  avowed  in  the  most  distinct  terms  that  unless 
the  Corn  Law  was  shown  to  be  good  for  the  whole  people 
it  could  not  stand;  and  his  freedom  in  dealing  with  it 
had  already  driven  extreme  Protectionists,  such  as  the 
Duke  of  Buckingham,  from  his  side.  The  general  ten- 
dency of  his  financial  policy  was  also  distinctly  in  the 
direction  of  Free  Trade.  For  a  man  in  his  position,  and 
under  the  party  system,  the  process  of  change,  as  has 
been  already  said,  was  desperately  difficult,  and  the 
utmost  allowance  ought  to  be  made  for  anything  am- 
biguous in  his  utterances  or  in  his  conduct.  He  was 
the  object  not  only  of  cruel  misconstruction,  but  of  ca- 
lumnious invention  on  the  part  of  enemies  who  certainly 
could  not  like  him  be  accused  of  lacking  imagination. 
It  was  most  circumstantially  stated  and  widely  believed, 
that  when  he  found  himself  no  longer  able  to  defend  the 
Corn  Law  he  had  contrived  to  shirk  a  debate,  and  to 
put  forward  his  young  lieutenant,  Sidney  Herbert,  to 
defend  the  Corn  Law  in  his  place.  He  was  of  all  men 
the  least  capable  of  such  an  act  of  treachery  to  a  friend. 

P  Charles  Pelham  Villiers,  statesman  ;  M.P.  for  Wolverhamp- 
ton  from  1835  till  1898  ;  held  many  high  posts.  1802-1898.] 

[2For  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Law.  He  brought  it  in  annually 
from  1838  till  its  abolition  in  1846.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  261 

Mr.  Morley  gives  what  is  probably  the  grain  of  truth  in 
the  story,  if  there  is  any  grain  of  truth  in  it  at  all.  He 
says  that  after  a  powerful  speech  from  Cobden,  Peel 
was  overheard  to  say  to  Sidney  Herbert,  "You  must 
answer  that,  for  I  cannot."  Whatever  construction 
may  be  put  upon  the  incident,  it  clearly  involves  nothing 
dishonourable  on  the  part  of  Peel. 

When  a  class  in  possession  of  power,  as  the  landlord 
class  was  in  the  Parliament  of  those  days,  refuses  jus- 
tice to  the  community,  agitation  is  the  only  remedy,  and 
it  is  better  than  civil  war.  But  it  entails  some  of  the 
moral  evils  of  civil  war.  What  says  Cobden  himself? — 

"You  must  not  judge  me  by  what  I  say  at  these 
tumultuous  public  meetings.  I  constantly  regret  the 
necessity  of  violating  good  taste  and  kind  feeling  in  my 
public  harangues.  I  say  advisedly  necessity ;  for  I  defy 
anybody  to  keep  the  ear  of  the  public  for  seven  years 
upon  any  one  question  without  striving  to  amuse  as 
well  as  instruct.  People  do  not  attend  public  meetings 
to  be  taught,  but  to  be  excited,  flattered,  and  pleased. 
If  they  are  simply  lectured,  they  may  sit  out  the  lesson 
for  once,  but  they  will  not  come  again ;  and  as  I  have 
required  them  again  and  again,  I  have  been  obliged 
to  amuse  them,  not  by  standing  on  my  head  or  eating 
fire,  but  by  kindred  feats  of  jugglery,  such  as  appeals 
to  their  self-esteem,  their  combativeness,  or  their  hu- 
mour. You  know  how  easily  in  touching  their  feel- 
ings one  degenerates  into  flattery,  vindictiveness,  or 
grossness." 

It  would  be  a  relief  to  him,  he  says,  to  know  that  he 
should  never  again  have  to  attend  a  public  meeting. 


262  REMINISCENCES 

If  this  was  true  of  Cobden,  how  much  more  must  it  have 
been  true  of  common  agitators !  The  passions  of  those 
whose  interest  was  threatened  were  of  course  inflamed  to 
fury  by  the  wordy  cannonade,  and  the  difficulty  of 
Peel's  task  in  bringing  them  round  was  increased  ten- 
fold. After  all,  as  Cobden  admits,  the  agitation  would 
have  failed  had  it  not  been  for  the  Irish  famine. 

It  was  perhaps  inevitable  that  the  leaders  of  the 
League  should  be  unjust  to  Peel,  as  well  as  wanting  in 
that  consideration  for  his  position  which  wisdom  bade 
them  show  if  they  wished  to  win  him  to  their  side. 
Unjust,  however,  they  were.  They  refused  to  recognize 
what  he  had  done  and  was  doing  for  the  gradual  pro- 
motion of  the  general  policy  of  Free  Trade;  they 
treated  with  contempt  his  great  budget  of  1842,  though 
as  a  step  in  economical  progress  it  was  second  in  im- 
portance only  to  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Law  itself ;  and 
they  persisted  in  fixing  on  him,  who  least  of  all  men  in 
power  deserved  it,  the  entire  responsibility  and  odium 
of  maintaining  a  system  which  was  paralyzing  trade  and 
spreading  distress  among  the  people.  Hence  arose  a 
personal  quarrel  between  him  and  Cobden,  of  which  it 
would  be  painful  to  speak  if  it  had  not  been  closed  by 
a  noble  reconciliation.  On  the  fifth  night  of  a  fierce 
debate  in  the  House  of  Commons,  when  party  passions 
were  at  fever  heat,  Cobden  made  a  very  bitter  attack 
on  Peel,  accusing  him  of  " folly  or  ignorance"  as  a 
financier,  treating  his  fiscal  legislation  with  the  most 
cutting  contempt,  and  pointing  to  him,  with  emphatic 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  263 

and  passionate  reiteration,  as  "  individually  respon- 
sible "  for  the  lamentable  and  dangerous  state  of  the 
country.  The  recent  murder  of  Peel's  secretary  and 
friend,  Mr.  Drummond,1  by  a  bullet,  which  was  supposed 
to  have  been  intended  for  Peel  himself,  was  in  every- 
body's mind;  and  when  Peel  in  his  reply  pounced 
angrily  on  the  expression  "individually  responsible," 
Protectionist  hatred  of  the  great  Leaguer  burst  forth  in 
a  fierce  shout  of  denunciation,  and  a  tornado  followed 
in  which  Peel's  anger  mounted  still  higher,  all  moral 
bearings  were  lost  and  all  attempts  at  explanation  be- 
came fruitless.  Peel  afterwards  positively  disclaimed 
the  atrocious  meaning  which  had  been  fixed,  in  the  fury 
of  the  moment,  on  his  words ;  and  he  surely  might  be 
pardoned,  especially  when  heated  by  debate,  for  fiercely 
resenting  an  attempt  to  hold  him  up  individually  to  a 
people  exasperated  by  suffering  as  the  author  of  their 
misery.  Cobden  himself  avows  that  he  meant  to 
frighten  Peel;  he  had  made  up  his  mind  that  "when 
Peel  bolted  or  betrayed  the  Protectionists  the  game 
would  be  up."  "It  was  this  conviction,"  he  says, 
"which  induced  me  after  some  deliberation  to  throw 
the  responsibility  upon  Peel ;  and  he  is  not  only  alarmed 
at  it,  but  indiscreet  enough  to  let  everybody  know  that 
he  is  so."  Surely  this  goes  far  to  justify  anything  that 
Peel  really  said. 

Mr.  Morley  quotes,  as  the  best  judgment  that  can  be 
passed  on  the  affair,  a  letter  written  immediately  after 
P  Edward  Drummond.     1792-1843.] 


264  REMINISCENCES 

it  by  Cobden,  in  which  Peel  is  accused  of  hypocritically 
feigning  emotion,  and  said  to  have  incurred  ridicule  as 
a  coward.  "Ah!  vousgdtezle!  Soyons  amis !  "  cried 
somebody  from  the  pit,  when  Augustus  in  "  Cinna  " 1  was 
recounting  the  vices  and  crimes  of  the  man  whose  hand 
he  was  about  to  take.  For  the  charge  of  simulating 
emotion  Mr.  Morley  is  of  course  able  to  cite  the  author- 
ity of  Disraeli.  Yet  nobody  who  knows  PeeFs  history 
can  doubt  that,  like  other  members  of  his  family,  he  had 
a  hot  temper,  though  it  was  usually  under  strict  con- 
trol. It  is  impossible  to  suppose  that  he  was  "acting 
the  part  of  the  choleric  gentleman"  in  the  tempestuous 
scene  which  occurred  when  Parliament  was  dissolved 
upon  the  rejection  of  the  Reform  Bill.  As  little  was  he 
open  to  the  imputation  of  cowardice ;  he  was  sensitive 
to  pain;  all  men  of  fine  organization  are;  and  there 
are  traces  in  his  correspondence  of  his  having  been 
rather  nervous,  or  of  somebody  having  been  nervous 
for  him,  about  plots ;  but  I  believe  I  am  right  in  saying 
that,  besides  his  affair  with  O'Connell,  whom  he  des- 
perately strove  to  drag  into  the  field,  he  on  three  other 
occasions  displayed  his  anachronistic  propensity  to 
fight  duels.  I  know  that  it  was  with  the  utmost  diffi- 
culty that,  by  an  appeal  to  his  feeling  for  the  Queen, 
he  was  dissuaded  from  sending  a  challenge  to  Lord 
George  Bentinck,  who  had  touched  his  honour  on  a 
point  on  which  it  was  particularly  sensitive,  by  traduc- 
ing the  integrity  of  his  relations  with  his  friends.  It 

[*  Corneille's  tragedy.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  265 

may  be  surmised  that  his  equivocal  position  in  the 
society  of  those  days  as  a  cotton-spinner  among  aristo- 
crats made  him  rather  more  peppery  in  resenting  insult 
than  he  would  otherwise  have  been.  What  is  certain 
is  that,  if  readiness  to  look  on  the  muzzle  of  a  pistol 
is  a  proof  of  courage,  Peel  cannot  have  been  a 
coward. 

All  soon  came  right  between  him  and  Cobden.  The 
two  soldiers  of  the  same  cause,  under  opposite  stand- 
ards and  in  hostile  uniforms,  recognized  each  other  and 
clasped  hands.  Cobden  wrote  Peel,  whose  defeat  by 
the  coalition  of  Whigs  and  Protectionists  on  the  Coer- 
cion Bill  was  then  impending,  a  confidential  letter  prom- 
ising him  hearty  support,  conjuring  him  to  dissolve  Par- 
liament, and  assuring  him,  if  he  would,  of  an  immense 
victory.  He  desired  Peel  to  burn  the  letter.  Peel  kept 
it,  and,  as  Mr.  Morley  says,  a  question  may  be  raised 
by  those  who  occupy  themselves  about  minor  morals. 
But  Peel  in  his  answer  says,  "I  need  not  give  you  as- 
surance that  I  shall  regard  your  letter  as  a  communi- 
cation more  purely  confidential  than  if  it  had  been 
written  to  me  by  some  person  united  to  me  by  the  closest 
bonds  of  private  friendship."  That  is  to  say,  "  I  have 
not  burned  the  letter,  but  I  will  keep  it  a  dead  secret ; " 
and  in  this  Cobden  tacitly  acquiesced.  Peel  must  have 
known  very  well  that  the  letter  would  be  eminently 
honourable  to  the  memory  of  both  of  them,  and  espe- 
cially to  that  of  the  writer,  who  thus  buried  in  a  moment 
all  past  enmities,  forgot  all  selfish  rivalries,  and  threw 


266  REMINISCENCES 

himself  into  the  arms  of  the  statesman  who  had  brought 
in  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Law.  «4^  WL.  »«1ta»4 

Had  Peel  taken  Cobden's  advice  and  dissolved,  no 
doubt  Cobden's  prediction  would  have  been  fulfilled. 
There  would  have  been  a  total  rout  of  the  Protectionists, 
and  among  others,  the  Member  for  Shrewsbury1  would 
have  lost  his  seat.  But  Peel  could  not,  without  a 
scandalous  disregard  of  old  ties,  have  appealed  to  the 
country  against  his  own  party.  Nor  could  he  have 
vaulted  at  once  from  the  leadership  of  the  Conservatives 
to  the  leadership  of  the  Liberals,  which  was  what  Cob- 
den  in  effect  proposed.  It  is,  in  short,  difficult  to  see 
how  he  could  have  done  anything  but  what  he  did. 
Those  who,  like  the  author  of  the  "Life  of  Lord  George 
Bentinck,"1  accuse  him  of  " astuteness,"  and  of  ma- 
noeuvring for  the  retention  of  his  place,  are  met  by  the 
fact  that,  on  finding  his  Cabinet  divided,  he  resigned, 
and  that  Lord  John  Russell  was  prevented  from  forming 
a  Government  only  by  an  objection  among  his  own 
friends  to  the  appointment  of  Palmerston  as  Foreign 
Minister,  which  no  astuteness  in  Peel  could  have  fore- 
seen, much  less  have  contrived.*  It  has  been  plausibly 
urged,  and  the  writer  of  this  paper  used  to  think,  that 
Peel  ought  to  have  held  a  meeting  of  his  party:  if  he 
was  prevented  from  taking  that  course  in  any  degree 

P  Benjamin  Disraeli.] 

*  The  author  of  the  "Life  of  Lord  George  Bentinck"  calls  this 
an  intrigue.  Everybody  was  an  intriguer  but  he.  The  objector 
was  about  the  most  inflexibly  upright  and  thoroughly  straight- 
forward of  public  men.  [Note  by  the  author.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  267 

by  want  of  frankness  and  moral  courage,  or  even  by  a 
punctilious  tenacity  of  his  own  authority  as  Minister, 
to  that  extent  he  did  wrong;  but  it  was  certain  that 
there  would  be  a  disagreement  at  the  meeting,  probable 
that  there  would  be  a  scene  of  great  violence.  What 
Stanley,1  Disraeli,  and  their  section  wanted  above  all 
things  was  to  produce  a  split;  and  the  consequence 
would  have  been  that  the  quarrel  in  the  House  would 
only  have  been  made  more  desperate  and  scandalous. 
The  result,  however,  was  inevitable,  nor  was  it  other- 
wise than  welcome  to  Peel,  who  was  careworn,  exhausted, 
ill  in  body,  and  deeply  wounded  by  the  quarrel  with  old 
friends.  He  fell  from  office,  but  not  from  power:  he 
remained  the  leading  man  in  England;  and  had  not 
his  life  been  accidentally  cut  short,  the  voice  of  the 
nation  would  almost  certainly  have  recalled  him  to  the 
helm. 

Peel's  failure  to  make  his  party  turn  round  with  him 
in  1846  has  been  contrasted  with  the  success  of  the  Tory 
leaders  in  1867.  But  Mr.  Morley  aptly  replies  that  the 
second  was  a  case  of  political  principle,  while  the  first 
was  a  case  of  pocket.  Besides  this,  in  1867  expedients 
were  used  which  were  quite  unknown  to  Peel;  the 
Tories  were  not  so  much  persuaded  as  decoyed ;  a  Min- 
ister put  up  to  say  that  the  House  of  Commons  would 
never  grant  household  suffrage,  and  the  pitfall  in  which 
that  revolutionary  measure  lurked  was  carefully  covered 

[ l  Afterwards  fourteenth  Earl  of  Derby.  He  was  Lord  Stanley 
of  Bickerstaffe  at  this  period  of  his  career.] 


268  REMINISCENCES 

with  Personal  Payment  of  Rates.  What  is  still  more 
important,  between  1846  and  1867  the  party  had  under- 
gone a  most  effective  process  of  education. 

Still,  there  is  a  moral  to  be  drawn.  The  one  man  in 
whom  the  nation  trusted,  and  had  reason  to  trust,  was 
driven  from  power  because  he  had  carried  a  measure 
which  was  urgently  needed  to  give  the  people  bread, 
and  which  was  soon  to  be  ratified  by  universal  approba- 
tion, even  those  who  had  most  rancorously  assailed  its 
author  at  the  time  acquiescing  as  soon  as  acquiescence 
became  necessary  to  them  as  a  passport  to  place.  The 
coalition  against  the  Coercion  Bill,1  by  which  this  was 
brought  about,  consisted  of  three  elements;  Conserva- 
tives who  had  themselves  supported  the  Coercion  Bill  in 
its  earlier  stage ;  Whigs  to  whom  coercion  was  familiar, 
and  who,  as  soon  as  they  had  tripped  up  Peel,  resorted 
to  it  again;  and  Radicals  who  were  then,  as  they  are 
now,  unused  to  government,  hardly  conscious  of  its 
necessities,  unready  to  avow  Republicanism,  but  ready 
to  make  unlimited  concessions  to  all  who  demanded 
them,  and  let  Irish  insurgents,  or  any  one  who  would, 
tear  to  pieces  the  heritage  of  the  commonwealth.  The 
one  great  gainer  by  the  transaction  was  a  man  whose 
motives  were  purely  personal,  as  he  used  afterwards 
very  frankly  to  avow ;  who,  on  a  question  affecting  not 
a  mere  political  theory,  but  the  subsistence  of  the  people 
who  were  starving  round  him,  was  taking  a  course  con- 
trary to  his  often  recorded  convictions,  and  traducing 

[l  Introduced  in  June,  1846.] 


BRIGHT  AND  COBDEN  269 

with  laborious  virulence  the  character  and  career  of  a 
statesman  whom  he  knew  to  be  doing  right,  on  whom 
a  little  time  before  he  had  been  lavishing  his  adulation, 
and  to  whom  he  had  been  a  suitor  for  place.  The  pro- 
gressive domination  of  such  characters  is  the  inherent 
tendency  of  the  party  system. 

In  spite  of  their  conflicts,  Peel  and  Cobden  were  really 
united  in  their  political  lives,  and  it  may  be  said  that  in 
death  they  were  not  divided.  Neither  of  them  was 
buried  in  Westminster  Abbey.  Peel  lies  among  his 
family  and  neighbours,  Cobden  lies  in  a  country  church- 
yard. A  man  who  had  worked  for  fame  will  like  to  rest 
in  a  pantheon ;  a  man  who  has  worked  for  duty  and  for 
the  approbation  of  the  power  of  duty  will  perhaps  pre- 
fer to  rest  by  the  side  of  honest  labour,  and  among  those 
whom  he  has  loved. 

Free  Trade  still  stands  pretty  much  where  it  stood 
on  the  morrow  of  the  reconciliation  of  Cobden  with  Peel. 
Their  visions  —  Cobden's  visions  at  least  —  have  not 
been  fulfilled.  The  reason  has  been  already  given. 
England,  while  she  preaches  Free  Trade,  and  thinks 
all  the  world  demented  because  it  will  not  listen  to  her 
preaching,  is  herself  not  a  Free  Trade  nation.  She 
raises  many  millions  by  import  duties,  which,  though 
admirably  well  adjusted  to  her  special  circumstances, 
are  not  the  less  interferences  with  freedom  of  trade. 
Every  nation  has  its  tariff,  every  nation  will  continue 
to  have  its  tariff  so  long  as  money  for  establishments 
and  armaments  is  required :  and  for  tariffs,  as  was  said 


270  REMINISCENCES 

before,  there  is  no  absolute  rule ;  each  country  must  be 
allowed  to  frame  its  own.  Cobden  assumed  that  the 
world  was  a  single  community ;  he  could  not  bring  the 
human  race  to  that  far-off  goal  of  philanthropy,  though 
he  did  something  to  help  it  on  its  way. 

It  seems  at  the  present  moment  *  as  if  the  same  thing 
might  be  said  with  too  much  truth  about  the  Irish 
Question.  It  was  upon  a  Coercion  Bill  that  the  Peel 
Government  fell,  Cobden  voting  against  the  Bill, 
though  apparently  more  because  this  was  the  regular 
line  of  his  political  section  than  in  obedience  to  any 
strong  opinion  of  his  own.  His  biographer's  hostility 
to  such  measures  is  more  decided.  "The  Ministry,"  he 
says,  "  resorted  for  the  eighteenth  time  since  the  Union 
to  the  stale  device  of  a  Coercion  Bill,  that  stereotyped 
avowal  —  and  always  made,  strange  to  say,  without 
shame  or  contrition  —  of  the  secular  neglect  and  incom- 
petency  of  the  English  government  of  Ireland."2  Sir 
Robert  Peel  was  not  incompetent,  nor  had  he  neglected 
the  Irish  Question;  on  the  contrary,  he  had  studied  it 
for  thirty  years  with  all  the  advantages  which  a  suc- 
cessive tenure  of  the  Irish  Secretaryship,  the  Home 
Secretaryship,  and  the  Premiership  could  afford,  and 
with  an  anxiety  proportioned  to  his  consciousness  that, 
as  he  said,  Ireland  was  the  difficulty  of  his  administra- 
tion. We  must  therefore  be  permitted  to  believe 

[x  Written  about  1888.  —  The  Irish  Crimes  Bill  (a  measure  of 
coercion)  was  introduced  in  March,  1887.] 

[2  Morley's  "Life  of  Richard  Cobden,"  vol.  i,  p.  360.  London  : 
1881.1 


BRIGHT  AND   COBDEN  271 

that  the  temporary  reinforcement  of  public  justice  in 
Ireland  during  outbreaks  of  murderous  anarchy  caused 
by  agitation  or  distress,  and  when  the  ordinary  law  has 
become  evidently  insufficient,  though  it  may  not  be  the 
highest  pinnacle  of  statesmanship,  is  not  the  lowest 
depth  of  ignorance,  carelessness,  or  folly.  That  force, 
while  necessarily  used  to  restrain  disorder,  is  no  remedy 
for  an  economical  malady,  is  a  truth  as  certain  and  as 
fruitful  as  that  the  strait-waistcoat,  necessarily  used  to 
control  madness  in  its  paroxysms,  is  no  remedy  for  a 
disease  of  the  lungs.  / 


CHAPTER  XV 

OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP 
1858-1866 

Settling  at  Oxford — Telepathy — Halford  Vaughan  —  Henry 
Smith  —  Max  Muller  —  Monier- Williams  —  Thorold  Rogers  — 
Rolleston  —  Waring  —  Coxe  —  Froude  —  Cradock  —  The  Great 
Western  Railway  —  King  Edward  VII  —  Prince  Leopold  — 
Dr.  Acland  —  Gladstone. 

IN  1858  I  was  appointed  Regius  Professor  of  Modern 
History  at  Oxford.  This  ended  my  connection  with 
the  Saturday  Review.  The  position,  while  it  was  wholly 
unsolicited,  was  the  height  of  my  desire.  I  thought 
with  pleasure  that  I  was  settled  in  it  for  life.  On  the 
North  of  the  "Parks"  I  built  me  a  little  house  which  I 
called  Parks  End,  and  which  afterwards  had  the  honour 
of  being  occupied  by  Max  Miiller l  and  after  him  by 
Professor  Osier.2  I  planted  my  little  garden.  I  laid 
out  my  little  croquet  ground,  which  in  summer  evenings 
was  the  scene  of  pleasant  little  croquet  parties  followed 
by  pleasant  little  suppers.  The  subject  of  my  Profes- 
sorship was  the  one  for  which  my  lamp  had  very  often 
been  lighted  long  before  sunrise.  The  future  smiled. 

Mortimer  was  within  easy  reach  by  rail.    I  could  go 

P  See  infra,  page  276.] 

[2  Regius  Professor  of  Medicine;  Honorary  Professor  of  Medi- 
cine of  Johns  Hopkins  University.  Born  at  Bond  Head,  Canada, 
in  1849.] 

272 


PHOTOGRAPH  OF  A  BUST  OP  GOLDWIN  SMITH 

Made  at  Oxford  about  1866,  by  Alexander  Munro. 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  273 

there  now  and  then  for  a  day  with  the  South  Berks 
hounds.  On  one  of  my  visits  there  happened  a  curious 
thing,  which  may  interest  the  Telepathists.  At  some 
distance  from  my  father's  house  I  was  seized  with  faint- 
ness,  to  which  I  was  liable.  After  lying  some  time  on 
the  common  I  got  water  at  a  cottage  and  reached  home. 
There  I  found  at  the  very  moment  of  my  faintness  a 
telegram  had  been  received  from  my  housekeeper  at 
Oxford  asking  whether  it  was  true  that  I  had  died  sud- 
denly. It  was  another  member  of  the  University  of 
the  same  name.  The  telegram  would  have  been  docu- 
mentary evidence;  which  in  these  cases  is  generally 
wanting.  Coincidence  would  as  usual  have  been  aided 
by  the  working  of  the  retroactive  imagination.  A  story 
was  told  by  Sir  Harry  Burrard  Neale  1  one  of  the  Bur- 
rard  family  with  which  mine  was  intimate  and  I  believe 
was  remotely  connected.2  An  old  couple  in  Scotland, 
Cameron,  I  think,  was  the  name,  left  their  home  to  seek 
for  their  only  son  who  had  been  carried  off  by  a  press- 
gang.  They  wandered  to  Lymington  on  the  Solent. 
There  a  kind  boatman  took  them  on  board  his  boat 
bound  for  Portsmouth,  where  they  would  find  the  men- 
of-war.  A  storm  came  on,  and  the  boat  was  in  danger. 
Sir  Harry  Burrard  Neale  was  coming  up  the  Solent  in 
his  ship,  the  San  Firenze.  He  saw  the  boat  in  danger, 
hove  to,  took  the  old  people  on  board,  and  asked  them 

I1  Second  Baronet,  Admiral.     1765-1840.] 

[2  Goldwin  Smith's  mother's  aunt,  Mrs.  Goldwin,  had  a  sister 
named  Mrs.  Coppell.  Mrs.  Coppell's  daughter  married  a  Mr. 
Burrard.] 


274  REMINISCENCES 

what  they  were  doing  at  sea  in  such  weather.  They 
told  him  that  they  were  seeking  for  their  son,  whose 
name  they  gave.  " There  is  a  pressed  man  of  that 
name,"  he  said,  "on  board  this  ship;  send  him  up." 
He  was  their  son.  To  this,  which  is  certainly  fact,  but 
not  less  certainly  mere  coincidence,  the  retroactive  im- 
agination of  the  two  old  people  would  probably  lend 
miraculous  colours. 

It  was  seldom  that  we,  or  anybody,  went  from 
home.  But  my  Mother  and  I  stayed  with  Sir  George 
Burrard,  rector  of  Yarmouth  in  the  Isle  of  Wight.1 
The  Burrard  family  before  the  Reform  Bill  had  been 
patrons  of  the  borough  of  Lymington,  which  sent  two 
members  to  Parliament,  and  Sir  George  held  three 
livings,  two  of  which  he  served  by  Curates.  He  was 
a  kindly  and  noble-looking  old  gentlemen,  with  knee 
breeches  and  powdered  hair.  In  those  days  was  to 
be  seen  at  Spithead  a  sight  of  beauty  and  grandeur 
which  will  never  be  seen  again;  that  of  the  great 
sailing  men-of-war. 

My  predecessor  in  the  Chair  was  Halford  Vaughan,2 
whose  history  was  one  of  genius,  mournfully,  almost 
tragically,  thrown  away.  As  a  student  he  had  shown 

["*  I  went  with  my  two  Boys  to  visit  my  Brothers  at  Southamp- 
ton and  Land's  End,  and  also  to  stay  with  Mr.  Burrard  at  Yar- 
mouth, April  15th,  [1828]."  —  Extract  from  Goldwin  Smith's 
mother's  Diary.  —  Goldwin  Smith's  mother  paid  another  visit 
to  Yarmouth  in  July  of  the  year  1833.  Her  little  son,  Goldwin, 
who  was  then  ten  years  old,  accompanied  her  on  that  occasion 
also.] 

[2  Henry  Halford  Vaughan.    1811-1885.] 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  275 

powers  of  mind  far  beyond  those  of  ordinary  prizemen. 
By  his  father,  who  was  a  Judge,  he  had  been  destined 
for  the  Bar;  but  his  heart  was  devoted  to  Philosophy. 
It  was  said  that  the  Judge  gave  him  as  an  exercise  a  case 
on  which  to  write  a  judgment,  and  on  reading  the  judg- 
ment wept  to  think  what  a  lawyer  was  going  to  be  lost. 
Vaughan's  lectures  on  the  Norman  Conquest  were  ad- 
mirable and  were  very  well  attended.  But  he  took  it 
into  his  head  that  regular  lecturing  was  intellectual 
slavery,  not  to  be  endured ;  he  resigned  his  chair ;  was 
reinstalled  by  the  efforts  of  friends;  and  again  re- 
signed. He  had  written  a  work  on  moral  philosophy 
which  was  understood  to  be  highly  original  and  of 
which  great  expectations  were  formed;  but  again  and 
again  when  his  work  was  on  the  point  of  publication 
some  strange  accident  occurred,  or  he  fancied  that  it 
had  occurred,  and  the  book  never  saw  light.  There 
can  be  little  doubt  that  Vaughan  in  the  end  became 
hypochondriac.  His  last  years  were  passed  in  retire- 
ment. His  lectures  were  never  published,  and  the  only 
fruit  of  his  genius  ever  given  to  the  world  was  a  not 
very  valuable  set  of  critical  notes  on  Shakespeare. 

Society  for  any  one  of  my  class  and  pursuits  could 
hardly  be  more  pleasant  than  it  was  at  Oxford  in  those 
days.  The  Professors  of  different  subjects,  with  the 
resident  Tutors  and  Fellows  of  Colleges,  formed  a  circle 
with  various  lines  and  interests,  moderate  incomes,  so- 
cially and  hospitably  disposed.  Hospitality,  easy  and 
frugal,  College  kitchens  and  Common  Rooms  supplied. 


276  REMINISCENCES 

At  the  little  dinner  parties  talk  was  rational  yet  bright 
and  merry.  The  old  academic  rust  had  departed. 
Oxford  was  now  within  an  hour  and  a  half  of  London, 
and  perfectly  in  the  world. 

The  most  eminent  of  the  group  was  Henry  Smith,1 
Professor  of  Mathematics,  and,  but  for  his  early  death, 
good  judges  thought  a  Newton  or  a  La  Place.  He  was 
generally  cultivated,  and  sparkled  with  wit.  One  of 
our  Professors  who  was  weak  in  his  aspirates  voted  at  an 
election,  at  which  Gladstone  and  Hardy  2  were  the  can- 
didates, and  meaning  to  vote  for  Gladstone,  in  his  ner- 
vous haste  said  "  'ardy."  Trying  to  correct  himself,  he 
said  that  he  had  not  finished  pronouncing  the  name. 
"He  has  not  begun  to  pronounce  it,"  said  Henry  Smith, 
who  was  sitting  as  scrutineer.  As  mathematical  profes- 
sor Henry  Smith  noted  a  falling  off  in  the  brain  power 
of  his  students  which  he  was  inclined  to  ascribe  to  smok- 
ing. At  Magdalen  when  I  was  there  nobody  smoked. 
One  of  the  Dons  still  took  snuff. 

Another  notability  was  Max  Miiller  3  on  whose  philo- 
logical glories  it  is  needless  to  dwell.  He  ought  by 
rights  to  have  been  Professor  of  Sanskrit.  But  in 
rejecting  him  in  favour  of  Monier-Williams 4  the  Univer- 

f1  Henry  John  Stephen  Smith.     1826-1883.] 

[2  Gathorne  Hardy.] 

P  The  Right  Honourable  Friedrich  Max  Miiller,  Professor  of 
Modern  Languages  and  afterwards  of  Comparative  Philology. 
Born  at  Dessau  in  1823  ;  died  in  1900.] 

[4  Sir  Monier  Monier-Williams,  K.C.I.E.,  D.C.L.,  LL.D.,  Fellow 
of  Balliol,  1882-1888 ;  Professor  of  Sanskrit  at  Oxford,  1860-1899. 
Born  in  1819;  died  April  11,  1899.] 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  277 

sity  was  not  so  far  guilty  of  bigotry  or  nativism  as  Dean 
Stanley  and  other  angry  friends  of  Max  Muller  sup- 
posed. The  professorship  was  a  very  recent  foundation, 
and  the  object  of  the  founder  had  unquestionably  been 
religious.  He  thought  that  Sanskrit,  as  a  key  to  the 
early  mythology  of  the  Hindoos,  would  be  a  help  to  the 
missionary.  There  could  be  no  doubt  that  he  would 
have  preferred  the  orthodox  Anglican  to  the  German 
freethinker. 

Thorold  Rogers,1  the  Professor  of  Political  Economy, 
was  and  looked  a  son  of  thunder.  He  was  a  strenuous 
worker  and  really  great  in  his  line,  though  not  perfectly 
judicial.  Perfectly  judicial  he  could  hardly  be,  as  he 
was  in  politics  a  strong  Radical.  He  sat  in  Parliament 
for  Southwark.2  On  the  hustings  he  said,  as  candi- 
dates always  do,  that  the  electors  would  certainly  return 
him.  "They'll  see  you  in  hell  first,"  cried  a  voice  in 
the  crowd.  '  '  My  dear  Sir,  "  replied  Rogers,  '  '  if  that  mis- 
fortune does  befall  me,  you  certainly  will  be  there  to  see 
it."  Rogers  was  also  a  writer  of  satires.  Of  the  two 
great  allies,  my  successors  in  the  Chair,  he  said, 

"  So,  ladling  flattery  from  their  several  tubs, 
Stubbs  butters  Freeman,  Freeman  butters  Stubbs." 

To  which  the  persons  satirized  raised  the  totally  irrele- 
vant objection  that  it  was  untrue. 

My  special  friend  was  Dr.  Rolleston,3  Professor  of 

P  See  Chapter  V,  page  84.] 
[2  Also  for  Bermondsey.] 

[3  George  Rolleston,  F.R.S.,  F.L.S.  ;  Fellow  of  Merton.  182&- 
1881.] 


I 


278  REMINISCENCES 

Physiology.  When  overwork  laid  him  in  an  early 
grave,  I  was  allowed  to  put  up  his  portrait  in  the  Com- 
mon Room  of  his  College.  But  no  portrait  could  do 
justice  to  his  enthusiasm  in  scientific  research,  his 
energy,  his  buoyancy,  his  humour,  the  life  which  he 
brought  into  our  social  circle.  I  wrote  under  the  por- 
trait, — 

Sic  indefessum  facie  spirante  vigorem, 

Veri  enitebar  mente  aperire  viam; 
Quum  vitae  et  vultus  nimio  lux  victa  labore  est, 

Et  vestra  abrepta  est  gloria  magna  domo. 

Wilson,1  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy,  afterwards  Presi- 
dent of  Corpus,  was  full  of  pleasant  wit.  So  was  Mark 
Pattison,  when  he  was  in  good  humour  and  at  his  best. 
I  could  give  a  string  of  names  well  remembered  by  me 
who  am  now  about  the  last  of  the  circle.  Mentem 
mortalia  tangunt. 

A  wonder,  though  known  to  few,  was  George  War- 
ing,2 the  most  universally  learned  man  of  all  my  ac- 
quaintance. He  had  graduated  late  at  what  was  then 
Magdalen  Hall,  now  Hertford  College.  He  was  mar- 
ried, settled  at  Oxford,  holding  no  academical  office, 
but  feeding  his  ravenous  hunger  of  knowledge.  One 
eye  he  had  lost,  the  other  was  weak  so  that  he  had  to 
hold  his  book  close  to  it.  The  whole  of  every  day  he 
spent  in  the  Bodleian  Library.  It  would  have  been 
hard  to  say  with  what  subject,  saving  physical  science, 
he  was  not  well  acquainted.  Yet  he  left  no  work,  nor 

f1  John  Matthias  Wilson.    1814-1881.] 

[2  Second  son  of  Henry  Waring,  of  Hereford.     Born  1807.] 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  279 

any  trace  of  himself  except  in  the  way  of  occasional  aid 
to  other  students.  The  University  was  near  giving  a 
large  price  for  what  pretended  to  be  a  Samaritan  manu- 
script. The  Professor  of  the  department  was  taken  in, 
but  Waring  detected  the  imposture. 

Waring  reminds  me  of  "Bodley"  Coxe/  the  prince  of 
librarians,  and  soul  of  the  social  circle.  Pattison  used 
to  say  that  the  librarian  who  read  was  lost.  I  think 
Coxe  had  read,  but  at  all  events  he  had  great  knowledge 
of  manuscripts.  An  impostor  tendered  the  library  a 
manuscript  pretending  to  the  highest  antiquity.  The 
curators  referred  it  to  Coxe.  At  the  subsequent  meet- 
ing, the  vendor  of  the  manuscript  being  present,  Coxe 
was  asked  what  he  considered  to  be  its  date.  He 
quickly  replied,  "I  should  say  about  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century." 

There  were  still  some  relics  of  the  Oxford  before  the 
flood  of  reform;  among  them  "Mo"  Griffith2  of  Mer- 
on,  and  Frowd,3  of  Corpus.  Each  was  slightly  non 
compos.  Frowd,  a  Fellow  of  Corpus,  was  annoyed  at 
the  trampling  of  grass  under  his  window.  He  set  a 
man-trap,  and  watching  for  the  result,  presently  heard 
a  scream,  rushed  down  and  found  he  had  caught  the 
Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy.  By  way  of  penance,  he 
condemned  himself  to  attendance  on  the  Professor's 
lectures  for  the  rest  of  the  term.  Lodging  in  London 


Henry  Octavius  Coxe,  Bodley's  librarian,  I860.] 
(Edward)  Moses  Griffith.    1767-1859.] 
John  Brickenden  Frowd.    1778-1865.] 


280  REMINISCENCES 

when  a  contested  election  at  Oxford  was  coming  on,  he 
wrote  letters  to  a  number  of  people  in  the  county  pro- 
posing to  pair.  Before  their  answers  had  time  to  come 
in,  he  ran  down  himself  to  Oxford  and  voted.  His  plea 
was  that  he  had  not  received  from  any  of  the  people  to 
whom  he  had  written  their  consent  to  pair.  There  was 
an  uproar,  of  course,  but  the  plea  of  insanity  was  entered 
and  accepted. 

A  remarkably  pleasant  house  was  that  of  Edward 
Hartopp  Cradock,1  the  Principal  of  Brasenose.  Mrs. 
Cradock  (she  was  a  Russell)  had  been  a  Maid  of  Hon- 
our. She  was  very  bright,  full  of  anecdote  and  fun. 
There  we  had  the  genuine  Afternoon  Tea,  a  meeting  of 
a  few  people  for  real  enjoyment,  with  talk,  music,  and 
reading  aloud;  far  different  from  the  social  battue  of 
people  crowded  into  a  house  in  which  there  is  hardly 
room  for  them  to  stand,  and  talking  against  a  hubbub, 
into  which  the  Afternoon  Tea  has  now  grown. 

It  chanced  that  I  had  to  do  a  little  fighting  for  the 
University.  Oxford  city,  which  did  not  fully  appre- 
ciate its  advantages  and  honours  as  the  seat  of  a  great 
University,  wanted  to  bring  the  Great  Western  Railway 
works  to  Oxford,  where,  besides  the  outrage  to  the 
genius  of  the  place,  building-land  could  ill  have  been 
spared.  The  University  shuddered,  but  feared  to 
move,  having  discredited  itself  by  foolishly  using  its 
influence  to  turn  away  the  line  of  the  Great  Western 

P  The  third  son  of  Edward  Grove,  of  Shenston,  Staffordshire.  — 
He  changed  his  name.  Died  in  1886.] 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  281 

Railway.  I  wrote  to  the  Times.  The  Times  backed 
my  letter.  One  of  the  Directors  of  the  railway  wrote 
to  me,  saying  that  he  was  heartily  with  me  and  that  if 
I  would  fight  outside  the  Board  he  would  fight  inside. 
I  did  fight,  got  society  on  my  side,  and,  with  the  help  of 
my  friend  in  the  other  camp,  won.  The  city,  which  had 
expected  great  gain  from  the  presence  of  the  works,  was 
very  angry,  and  for  some  days  my  house  had  to  be 
guarded  by  the  police.  The  works  went  to  Swindon, 
where  they  are  much  better  placed  in  every  respect,  and 
peace  returned.  I  almost  think  I  could  have  gone  to 
Parliament  for  Oxford.  Harcourt,1  who  did  go,  was  in- 
troduced to  the  city  by  me.  A  seat  in  Parliament  for 
myself,  as  I  have  said,  I  never  desired. 

As  Professor  of  History  at  Oxford  I  had  for  a  pupil 
the  present  King,  then  Prince  of  Wales.2  He  was  a 
comely  youth,  like  his  mother  in  face,  and  with  a  slight 
German  accent,  showing,  as  he  had  not  been  in  Ger- 
many, that  German  was  spoken  in  his  domestic  circle. 
His  manner  was  very  engaging  and  he  was  thoroughly 
good-natured.  I  am  sure  I  bored  him  when  I  went  to 
examine  him  in  history.  A  malicious  story  was  current 
about  Prince  Albert's  death.  It  was  said  to  have  been 
caused  by  sleeping  in  an  unaired  bed  when  he  had  gone 
down  suddenly  to  Cambridge,  where  his  son  then  was, 
to  break  off  a  bad  engagement.  I  can  say  positively 

[l  Sir  William  George  Granville  Vernon  Harcourt.  See  note  on 
page  163,  Chapter  XI.] 

[2  This  refers,  of  course,  to  his  late  Majesty,  King  Edward  VII.] 


282  REMINISCENCES 

that  the  story  was  untrue.  I  was  invited  to  go  with 
the  Prince's  party  to  Canada ;  but  could  not  leave  my 
Chair.  The  notion  that  I  wanted  anything  in  Canada 
was  preposterous.  I  was  happily  and  perfectly  settled 
for  life.  The  King 1  has  always  shown  a  kindly  remem- 
brance of  his  old  preceptor. 

Common  Room  Society  must  have  been  greatly 
broken  up  by  the  marriage  of  Fellows,  which,  as  I 
have  said,  was  necessary  in  order  to  secure  an  order  of 
teachers  devoted  to  their  calling.  But  its  like  will 
not  easily  be  found. 

Prince  Leopold 2  afterwards  came  to  Oxford,  where  I 
was  introduced  to  him  and  had  the  honour  of  teaching 
him  euchre.  The  weakness  of  his  constitution  debarred 
him  from  active  sports  and  made  him  a  musician  and 
something  of  a  virtuoso.  He  played  well  upon  the 
piano.  I  was  his  guest,  and,  after  his  death,  that  of  the 
Princess,  his  widow,  at  Claremont.  It  was  curious  to 
see  the  gentle  pair  entertaining  us  with  music  in  the 
great  room  carpeted  with  the  sumptuous  gift  of  an 
Indian  Prince,  which  Clive  had  probably  paced,  dis- 
tracted with  agony,  in  the  dark  evening  of  his  stormy 
day.  The  Duchess  was  a  charming  hostess,  and  has 
remained  a  most  kind  and  valued  friend.  As  I  write 
this  I  mentally  kiss  her  hand. 

One  morning  as  I  was  sitting  in  my  library  my  maid 


[l  His  late  Majesty,  King  Edward  VII.] 

P  Duke  of  Albany.     Youngest  brother  of  the  late  King,  Edward 
VII.] 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  283 

came  to  tell  me  that  there  were  two  gentlemen  waiting 
in  the  other  room  to  see  me.  To  my  surprise  one  of 
them  introduced  the  other  as  the  Crown  Prince  of  Den- 
mark.1 But  I  had  scarcely  got  him  into  my  hands  as  a 
pupil  when  he  was  snatched  away  by  the  Schleswig- 
Holstein  War.2 

My  excellent  friend  Dr.  Acland,3  the  Professor  of 
Medicine,  in  whose  house  many  a  pleasant  evening  was 
passed,  went  with  the  Prince  to  Canada.  He  was  very 
affable,  and  not  very  guarded.  At  a  ball  at  Quebec  he 
was  accosted  by  a  stranger  of  gentlemanly  manner,  who 
drew  him  into  conversation  about  the  Prince.  He  said 
that  the  Prince  was  extremely  amiable,  but  had  not  the 
brains  of  his  brother,  the  Duke  of  Edinburgh.  When 
the  stranger  went  away,  some  one  asked  Acland  whether 
he  knew  to  whom  he  had  been  talking.  Acland  said 
that  he  did  not.  "That  was  the  correspondent  of  the 
New  York  Herald"  A  day  or  two  afterwards  the 
Prince  came  down  to  breakfast  flourishing  in  his  hand 
a  copy  of  the  New  York  Herald  and  saying,  "Acland,  I 
see  that  you  think  I  am  very  amiable,  but  I  have  not 
the  brains  of  my  brother  Edinburgh."  This  shows  his 
good  nature. 

In  Canada,  Oronyatekha,4  the  Great  that  was  to  be, 
was  introduced  to  Acland  as  a  decided  proof  of  Indian 

f1  The  present  King  Frederik  VIII.] 
[2  1864.] 

[3  Afterwards  Sir  Henry  Wentworth  Acland.    1815-1900.] 
[4  Dr.  Oronyatekha  was  afterwards  Supreme  Chief  Ranger  of  the 
Independent  Order  of  Foresters.     Born  1841 ;  died  1907.] 


284  REMINISCENCES 

capacity.  Acland,  always  kind,  and  apt  to  be  gushing, 
told  Oronyatekha  that  they  must  have  him  at  Oxford. 
Some  time  afterwards,  thanks,  I  believe,  to  the  liberality 
of  the  Prince,  when  Acland  was  at  Oxford,  Oronyatekha 
appeared.  Acland  entered  him  at  what  was  then  Mag- 
dalen Hall  and  is  now  Hertford  College.  It  was  not 
likely  that  academical  studies  or  college  rules  would 
suit  the  aspiring  Indian.  He  at  all  events  left  Magda- 
len Hall  for  a  more  practical  field  without  taking  a  de- 
gree. Such  was  the  version  of  the  story  which  I  heard 
at  the  time.  Another  version  introduces  the  Prince  of 
Wales. 

James  I.  had  kindly  but  unwisely  given  the  Univer- 
sity representation  in  Parliament,  which  involved  it  in 
politics.  We  had  some  fierce  fights,  owing  to  the  grad- 
ual approximation  of  Gladstone  to  the  Liberals  and  his 
consequent  estrangement  from  his  Tory  friends,  who 
sought  angrily  to  unseat  him  as  an  apostate.  In  those 
days  I  was  a  fervent  adherent  of  Gladstone,  and  an  ac- 
tive member  of  his  Committee.  Our  difficulty  was  in 
holding  together  the  two  sections  of  his  supporters ;  the 
High  Churchmen,  who  clung  to  him  for  the  sake  of  his 
religious  opinions,  hoping  that  he  would  influence 
Church  appointments;  and  the  Liberals,  who  wel- 
comed his  political  advances  towards  their  side.  Pal- 
merston,  in  whose  Ministry  Gladstone  was  Chancellor 
of  the  Exchequer,  was  fishing,  through  Lord  Shaftes- 
bury,  for  the  Evangelical  vote,  and  allowed  Shaftesbury 
to  appoint  Low  Church  Bishops.  This  brought  our 


OXFORD  PROFESSORSHIP  285 

difficulty  to  a  head.  I  was  instructed  to  see  Gladstone 
and  explain  to  him  that  unless  his  influence  were  soon 
seen  in  Church  appointments,  the  High  Church  section 
would  bolt,  and  his  seat  for  the  University  would  be 
lost.  He  began  as  usual  by  combating  the  fact.  This 
was  his  way,  and  I  could  only  let  it  pass.  Presently  he 
came  round  and  asked  whom  they  wanted  made  a 
Bishop.  Probably  he  addressed  the  question  to  himself 
rather  than  to  me ;  the  answer  at  all  events  was  not 
in  my  instructions.  The  upshot  of  this  and  probably 
other  representations  of  the  same  kind  from  different 
quarters  was  the  appointment  of  Thomson,1  Provost  of 
Queen's,  to  the  Bishopric  of  Peterborough,  from  which 
he  soon  afterwards  mounted  to  the  Archbishopric  of 
York. 

The  Tories  made  a  grand  mistake  in  ejecting  Glad- 
stone from  his  seat  for  the  University.  They  thereby, 
as  he  himself  said,  " unmuzzled"  him.  It  curiously 
happened  that  on  the  day  of  his  defeat  the  Bible  fell 
from  the  hand  of  the  statue  of  James  I  in  the  quad- 
rangle of  the  Bodleian.  It  was  an  omen  of  the  separa- 
tion of  the  Church  from  the  State,  towards  which  Glad- 
stone's abolition  of  the  State  Church  of  Ireland  was  an 
important  step,  and  towards  which  he  would  have  taken 
another  important  step  had  he  carried  out  his  pledge 
of  Disestablishment  for  Wales.  I  suspected,  however, 
that  of  that  pledge  he  repented,  and  that  his  unwilling- 
ness to  fulfil  it  was  partly  the  cause  of  his  final  retire- 
p  William  Thomson.  1819-1890.] 


286  REMINISCENCES 

ment  from  power.  He  remained  to  the  last  a  High 
Churchman.  To  the  last  High  Churchmen  were  his 
bosom  friends,  and  they  clung  to  him  in  spite  of  his 
political  changes.  They  might  bear  with  equanimity 
the  disestablishment  of  the  Irish  Church,  which  was 
separate  from  the  Church  of  England,  and,  from  an- 
tagonism to  the  Irish  Roman  Catholics,  Low  Church 
in  its  doctrine.  But  the  disestablishment  of  the  Church 
of  Wales,  an  integral  part  of  the  Church  of  England, 
would  have  cut  them  to  the  heart. 

The  University  Reform  Bill  and  Oxford  University 
elections  brought  me  a  good  deal  into  contact  with 
Gladstone.  I  followed  him  zealously  till  he  suddenly 
embraced  the  policy  which  he  had  himself  described  as 
"wading  through  rapine  to  dismemberment."  Then, 
not  being  able  on  the  spur  of  the  moment  to  invert  my 
notions  either  of  rapine  or  dismemberment,  I  was  con- 
strained not  only  to  leave  him,  but  to  do  my  best  in  aid 
of  the  opponents  of  his  "Home  Rule." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

PUBLIC   EVENTS 

Crimean  War — The  War  Passion  —  The  War  Policy  —  Napoleon 
III  —  The  Chartist  Procession. 

THERE  is  no  use  in  rehearsing  the  "Annual  Register." 
We  of  the  Manchester  School  were  against  the  Crimean 
War,  and  suffered  by  the  war  fever.  The  impression 
which  I  afterwards  gathered  from  friends  who  had  the 
best  means  of  information  was  that  the  coalition  Gov- 
ernment of  Lord  Aberdeen,1  weak  from  internal  differ- 
ences between  Whigs  and  Peelites,  while  its  chief,  Lord 
Aberdeen,  though  the  best  of  men,  was  wanting  in 
firmness,  had  been  gradually  drawn  to  the  brink  of  war 
by  three  men,  each  of  whom  had  personal  motives. 
Palmerston  was  a  fanatical  enemy  of  Russia,  as  the  fatal 
expedition  to  tke  Cabul  proved,  and  probably  not  very 
loyal  to  Lord  Aberdeen,  a  Peelite  and  a  Minister  of  peace. 
Sir  Stratford  Canning  2  the  Czar 3  had  refused  to  receive 
as  Ambassador  at  St.  Petersburg.  Louis  Napoleon,  like 
his  putative  uncle,  wanted  the  consecration  of  glory  for 
his  usurped  throne,  and  a  recognized  place  for  himself, 
an  upstart  of  birth  not  unquestioned,  among  the 
crowned  heads  of  Europe,  which  he  gained  by  being 

f1  See  page  185,  et  seq.,  Chapter  XII.] 

P  Afterwards  Viscount  Stratford  de  Redcliffe.     1786-1880.] 

[3  Nicholas  I.] 

287 


288  REMINISCENCES 

allowed  publicly  to  embrace  the  Queen  of  England.  It 
is  possible  that  the  French  Emperor  had  the  further 
design  of  sowing  enmity  between  powers  the  union  of 
which  might  have  stood  in  the  way  of  his  ulterior  views. 
He  was  a  political  cracksman  who  with  his  legs  under 
your  table  would  be  meditating  a  raid  upon  your  strong- 
box. His  friend  and  confederate,  Palmerston,  at  last 
awakened  to  his  real  character  and  bade  the  nation 
stand  upon  its  guard. 

Sir  Roderick  Murchison,  the  geologist,  who,  having 
been  invited  to  explore  the  mineral  resources  of  the  Ural, 
-  had  been  intimate  with  the  Czar,  assured  me  that 
Nicholas  always  spoke  in  the  most  cordial  terms  of 
Great  Britain,  which  he  regarded  as  the  great  conser- 
vative power.  His  offence  and  the  cause  of  war,  so  far 
as  could  be  made  out  through  the  cloud  of  diplomatic 
dust,  was  a  premature  anticipation  of  the  dissolution  of 
the  Turkish  Empire,  to  a  partition  of  which  and  a  share 
r^JU-*'  of  the  wreck  he  invited  Great  Britain. 

In  the  case  of  the  Crimean,  as  afterwards  in  that 
of  the  Lorcha,  War  was  seen  the  fatal  ease  with  which 
the  war  passion  is  kindled  when  the  means  of  indulging 
it,  great  armaments,  are  at  hand.  On  the  eve  of  the 
Crimean  War  nobody  believed  that  it  was  coming.  Few 
understood  the  diplomatic  quarrel.  But  in  an  instant 
all  was  aflame.  Bright  was  burnt  in  effigy,  and  every 
one  who  talked  of  bringing  the  war  to  an  end  was  a 
traitor.  Tennyson  wrote  those  burning  lines  in 
"Maud,"  assuming  that  the  weaker  passions  would  be 


PUBLIC  EVENTS  289 

extinguished  by  the  fiercer;  though  to  the  ordinary 
frauds,  such  as  that  of  Strahan  and  Paul,1  were  added 
the  usual  frauds  of  contractors;  while  if  there  was  a 
" giant  liar"  on  whom  it  behooved  that  the  " justice  of 
God  "  should  be  done,  it  was  Tennyson's  ally,  the  French 
Emperor.  Yet  the  grass  had  barely  grown  on  the 
graves  of  Sebastopol  before  opinion  turned  against  the 
war.  The  Lorcha  war  was  kindled  by  Bowring,2  the 
British  Resident  at  Canton,  a  disciple  of  Bentham, 
who  had  quarrelled  with  the  native  authorities  and  em- 
braced the  opportunity  of  promoting  the  greatest  hap- 
piness of  the  greatest  number  by  throwing  bombs  into 
the  most  densely  peopled  city  in  the  world.  It  was 
practically  a  war  in  defence  of  the  opium  trade.  By 
the  House  of  Commons  it  was  condemned.  But  when 
Palmerston  appealed  to  the  people,  telling  them  that  an 
insolent  barbarian  had  trampled  on  the  honour  of  the 
Empire  by  hauling  down  the  flag  of  an  opium  smuggler, 
the  flame  burst  out  in  full  fury.  Opponents  of  the  war 
lost  their  seats  in  Parliament.  The  letters  of  the  good 
Lord  Elgin,  who  was  sent  to  coerce  the  Chinese,  show 
his  feeling  about  his  mission  and  the  war.3  So  long  as 
there  are  great  armaments  on  foot,  wars  of  passion  will 
not  cease. 


f1  Messrs.  Strahan,  Paul,  and  Bates,  bankers  and  navy  agents, 
suspended  payment  on  June  the  llth,  1855.] 

P  Sir  John  Bowring.     1792-1872.] 

[3  "Letters  and  Journals  of  James,  eighth  Earl  of  Elgin."  .  .  . 
Edited  by  Theodore  Walrond.  London:  Murray.  1872.  Pages 
212,  et  seq.] 


290  REMINISCENCES 

During  the  Crimean  War  I  was  much  at  the  house  of 
my  very  kind  and  dear  friend  Mrs.  Pearson,1  the  sister  of 
Admiral  Lyons.2  Loss  of  the  Agamemnon,  Lyons's 
ship,  was  cried  by  newsboys  under  her  window.  To 
show  in  what  a  state  was  the  supply  department,  the 
Admiral  wrote  to  his  sisters  begging  them  to  buy  for  him 
some  quinine,  of  which  the  army  was  in  great  want. 
His  sisters,  on  proceeding  to  fulfil  his  request,  were  told 
by  the  War  Office  that  they  might  spare  their  pains, 
since  quinine  had  been  bought  by  the  Government  till 
the  price  of  it  had  greatly  risen  in  the  market.  It  was 
all  the  time  lying  at  Balaklava  in  the  hold  of  a  ship 
filled  with  other  stores.  The  machine  had  just  been 
brought  into  working  order  when  Louis  Napoleon 
stopped  the  war. 

The  state  of  things  was  probably  in  some  measure  due 
to  the  senile  despotism  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington  at  the 
Horse  Guards.  The  Duke's  mind  was  failing  in  his  last 
years,  as  he  showed  by  foolish  fondness  for  a  woman  of 
fashion,  Mrs.  Jones  of  Eant-y-Glass  [sic],3  as  well  as  by 

f1  Mrs.  Henry  Shepherd  Pearson,  formerly  Caroline  Lyons.] 
[2  Edmund  Lyons,  first  Baron  Lyons.     1790-1858.] 
[»  This  was  Margaret  Charlotte,  daughter  of  Sir  George  Camp- 
bell, of  Edenwood,  Fifeshire,  and  wife  of  David  Jones,  of  Pantglas, 
Carmarthen,  Member  of  Parliament  for  Carmarthen  from  1852  to 
1874.     She  married  a  second  time,  after  his  death.     Born  1825 ; 
died  1871.    A  selection  from  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  letters  to 
Mrs.  Jones  were  published,  with  the  Duke's  grandson's  permission, 
in  The  Century  Magazine  of  December,  1889  (Volume  XXXIX,  No.  2, 
p.  163),  by  Mary  Eleanor,  wife  of  Herbert  Davies-Evans,  Esq.,  of 
Highmead,  Llanybyther,  South  Wales,  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Cardi- 
>I      ganshire.    Mrs.  Davies-Evans  is  a  daughter  of  Mrs.  Jones,  and  to 
yV  her  I  am  indebted  for  kindly  referring  me  to  these  letters.] 


PUBLIC  EVENTS  291 

a  long  and  strange  though  innocent  correspondence 
with  another  woman.1  Of  the  influence  of  Mrs.  Jones 
of  Pant-y-Glass  Cobden  told  me  a  strange  story  which 
he  said  he  had  on  the  best  authority.  Her  name  had 
appeared  in  the  promotion  lists. 

There  was  an  outcry  because  the  allied  fleets  did  not 
attack  Odessa,  the  Russian  arsenal.  Absurd  suspicions 
were  cast  upon  as  loyal  a  gentleman  as  ever  lived,  Sidney 
Herbert,  who  had  Russian  connections  through  his  wife. 
When  the  war  was  over,  I  asked  the  Duke  of  Newcastle, 
who  had  been  in  the  Cabinet,  why  Odessa  had  not  been 
attacked.  His  reply  was  that  the  French  Emperor 
would  not  consent. 

I  have  alluded  to  the  French  Emperor's  birth.  I 
once  asked  the  best  authority  I  knew  on  social  France  2 
whether  Louis  Napoleon  was  the  son  of  his  reputed 
father,  and  whether  the  Prince  Imperial,  on  whose  birth 
also  doubt  was  cast,  was  the  child  of  his  reputed  parents. 
The  first  question  was  answered  decidedly  in  the  nega- 
tive ;  the  second  not  less  decidedly  in  the  affirmative. 
There  seems  to  be  little  doubt  that  Louis  Napoleon  was 
the  son  of  the  Dutch  Admiral  Verhuel.  Court  painters 
and  sculptors  struggled  in  vain  to  give  him  the  Napo- 
leonic brow.  Perhaps  his  Dutch  phlegm  and  reticence 
gave  him  some  advantage  over  the  volatile  Frenchmen 
with  whom  he  had  to  deal. 

f1  This  probably  refers  to  "  Miss  J.,"  Wellington's  letters  to  whom 
were  published  in  1890.] 

[2 1  think  this  must  refer  to  Lady  Verney,  wife  of  Sir  Harry 
Verney.] 


292  REMINISCENCES 

Delane,  of  the  Times,  who  was  with  the  army  on  its 
way  to  the  Crimea,  gave  bad  accounts  of  the  behaviour 
of  the  French  soldiery.  He  said  that  at  Varna,  a  fire 
having  broken  out,  advantage  was  taken  of  it  by  some 
Zouaves  to  violate  the  beautiful  daughter  of  a  Greek 
baker,  and  that  when  complaint  was  made  to  the  French 
Commander,  he  treated  it  with  indifference.  The  corps 
of  Zouaves,  however,  was  hardly  French.  Nominally 
Algerian,  it  was  recruited  from  waifs  of  various  races. 
It  was  said  that  a  British  officer  in  the  Crimea  addressed 
a  Zouave  officer  in  French.  The  Zouave  answered  in 
good  English.  "Why,"  said  the  Englishman,  "you 
speak  English  very  well."  "I  should  think  I  did.  I 
was  with  you  at  Eton." 

I  saw  from  the  window  of  the  Athenaeum  the  return 
of  the  Guards  from  the  Crimea.  They  marched  with 
great  simplicity,  through  a  crowd  rather  full  of  emotion 
than  demonstrative,  to  their  barracks.  I  have  wit- 
nessed more  ostentatious  but  less  impressive  ovations. 

It  is  with  amusement  now  that  one  looks  back  on  the 
alarm  felt  in  London  on  the  10th  of  April  1848,1  and  the 
military  preparations  made  to  encounter  a  phantom  of 
our  fancy.  We  parted  on  the  evening  before  the 
dreaded  day,  imagining  that  something  terrible  would 
happen  before  we  met  again.  The  House  of  Commons 
sat  surrounded  by  a  cordon  of  troops.  I  had  the  honour 
to  command  a  squad  of  special  constables  posted  in 
Oxford  Street.  There  was  a  stream  of  working-men 
t1  The  day  of  the  Chartist  demonstration.] 


PUBLIC  EVENTS  293 

eastward,  but  nothing  to  excite  the  slightest  alarm. 
The  car  containing  the  monster  petition  *  of  the  dreaded 
revolutionists  was  arrested  on  its  way  to  Westminster 
by  the  special  constables,  who  thought  that  the  crowd 
had  been  robbing  Astley's.2  The  demonstration,  how- 
ever, was  effective  in  showing  that  England  was  op- 
posed to  revolution. 

P  Of  the  Chartists.] 

P  Astley's  Circus,  afterwards  Sanger's.] 


CHAPTER   XVII 

ELECTIONS 

Anthony    John  Mundella — Sheffield  —  Trades-Unionism  —  Nurs- 
ing a  Constituency  —  Election  Tactics  —  The  Party  System. 

AGAINST  the  siren  voices  which  lured  me  to  stand  for 
a  seat  in  Parliament  I  stopped  my  ears,  knowing  my 
total  want  of  oratorical  power,  and  being  moreover  little 
disposed  to  run  the  gantlet  of  popular  election.  The 
only  instance  in  which  I  yielded  was  in  the  mortal 
struggle  for  the  integrity  of  the  United  Kingdom  against 
Gladstone  and  Home  Rule ;  and  luckily  for  me  on  that 
occasion  I  was  saved  by  the  delay  of  a  telegram  from 
the  consequences  of  my  compliance,  and  thus  cheaply 
discharged  my  conscience  as  a  patriot.  But  I  enjoyed 
acting  as  bottle-holder  to  a  friend.  Mundella1  asked 
me  to  be  with  him  when  he  first  stood  for  Sheffield.  We 
had  to  fight  Roebuck,  justly  named  "Tear  'em,"  who 
having  once  been  the  most  violent  of  Radicals  had 
become  the  most  violent  of  those  who  are  now  called 
Jingoes,  the  most  fanatical  enemy  of  the  American 
Republic,  a  prominent  upholder  of  the  Turk,  and  the 
most  outrageous  of  anti-philanthropists,  advocating 

P  Anthony  John  Mundella.  He  was  M.P.  for  Sheffield  from 
1868  to  1885 ;  and  for  the  Brightside  division  of  Sheffield  from  1885 
to  1897.  The  general  elections  referred  to  were  held  in  November 
and  December  of  1885.] 

294 


ELECTIONS  295 

the  extermination  of  "the  wild  man."  We  had,  as 
might  have  been  expected,  an  exciting  time.  Sheffield 
in  those  days  was  the  seat  of  trades-unionism  in  its  most 
sinister  form.  Not  very  long  before  had  taken  place  the 
Sheffield  murders.  Mundella  was  approached  by  the 
most  violent  of  the  Unions.  I  asked  him  whether  he 
could  conscientiously  give  the  pledges  which  the  Union 
required,  and  on  his  saying  that  he  could  not,  I  advised 
him  not  to  palter  but  to  refuse  point-blank,  and  thus, 
openly  breaking  with  the  Union,  to  win  the  suffrages  of 
its  enemies.  The  Government  Whip,  Mr.  Sellar,1 
through  whom  Mundella  sent  his  invitation  to  me,  had 
believed  we  should  be  beaten  and  questioned  the  ex- 
pediency of  a  contest  which  would  send  Roebuck  back 
to  Parliament  a  more  violent  enemy  to  the  Government 
than  ever.  I  appealed  to  Gladstone,  who  was  always 
for  fighting.  We  won,  and  by  a  large  majority. 

At  Sheffield  we  were  opposed  by  the  local  Union. 
But  I  was  no  enemy  to  Unions  in  general.  On  the  con- 
trary, I  maintained  that  Unions  in  general  were  plainly 
needed  to  protect  the  interests  of  the  working-men 
against  the  confederation  of  employers.  I  bore  some 
hard  knocks  in  that  conflict.  Keeping  to  lawful  and 
proper  courses,  the  Unions  may  do  good  in  other  ways 
besides  that  of  securing  fair  wages.  To  violence,  intimi- 
dation, or  monopoly,  it  is  needless  to  say,  I  never  could 
have  been  a  friend.  The  Unions,  if  they  take  to  those 
ways,  will  fall  into  the  grave  of  the  Guilds.  When  I  see 

[l  Alexander  Craig  Sellar,  M.P.  from  1882  to  1888.     1835-1890.] 


296  REMINISCENCES 

an  exulting  announcement  that  a  tradesman  has  been 
ruined  by  refusal  to  use  the  Union  label,  it  is  clear  that 
there  is  something  very  wrong,  and  sure  if  it  continues 
to  rouse  the  community  to  resistance.  Two  great 
dangers  are  the  leadership  of  professional  agitators  and 
the  ascendency  in  the  Union  councils  of  young  unmar- 
ried men. 

I  took  part  in  several  other  elections  besides  that  of 
Sheffield,  and  saw  some  lively  scenes;  for,  in  spite  of 
reforms,  elections  retained  traces  of  their  old  character, 
and  the  meeting  would  sometimes  be  stormed  by  the 
enemy.  Going  with  my  excellent  friend  George  Brod- 
rick,1  afterwards  Warden  of  Merton,  to  Woodstock,  I 
had  an  opportunity  of  studying  the  protean  character  of 
bribery,  which  is  not  exterminated  by  bribery  laws,  but 
only  chased  from  one  form  into  another,  and  when  sup- 
pressed in  the  form  of  money  takes  that  of  blankets  or 
other  doles.  I  knew  a  city  in  which,  of  the  two  seats, 
one  was  always  fiercely  contested,  but  the  other  was 
securely  held  by  a  man  who  had  no  political  qualifica- 
tions, probably  took  little  interest  in  politics,  and 
seldom,  except  at  elections,  came  near  the  place.  He 
wanted  the  social  grade  and  opportunities  which  a  seat 
in  the  House  of  Commons  then  conferred.  His  method 
was  simple.  At  Christmas  a  large  sum  of  money  was 
distributed  by  his  local  manager  among  the  poor  elec- 
tors, of  whom  there  were  a  good  many.  Not  a  word 
Was  said  about  votes,  nor  was  any  distinction  made  on 

t1  The  Honourable  George  Charles  Brodrick.] 


ELECTIONS  297 

that  score.  But  the  recipients  were  left  to  conclude 
that  the  largess  would  continue  so  long  as  the  donor 
was  their  Member.  The  seat  probably  cost  its  purchaser 
less  than  a  yacht,  and  for  his  social  objects  the  money 
was  well  spent.  At  a  party  meeting  before  a  general 
election  at  which  I  was  present,  the  question  was  raised 
as  to  the  candidacy  for  a  particular  seat.  One  of  those 
present  told  us  that  we  need  not  trouble  ourselves  about 
that  seat;  it  was  already  booked  by  a  local  man  of 
wealth.  I  said  the  name  surprised  me,  as  I  thought 
the  man  took  no  interest  in  politics.  "  Neither  does 
he,"  was  the  reply.  "Then  why  does  he  want  the 
seat?  "  "He  does  not  want  it."  "Then  why  does  he 
take  it?  "  "Because  his  wife  does."  I  think  I  could 
have  pointed  to  a  wealthy  and  titled  pair  whom  any 
Minister  might  have  made  his  own  by  getting  them  an 
invitation  to  a  Court  Ball.  Nursing  boroughs,  it  seems, 
has  now  become  a  system.  It,  at  all  events,  like  bribery 
of  the  old  style,  costs  the  State  nothing,  and  the  corrup- 
tion is  limited.  Demagogic  bribery  by  the  sacrifice  of 
public  interests  corrupts  the  community  at  large,  and 
costs  the  State  a  good  deal.  Witness  the  American 
Pension  List. 

At  elections  you  must  have  mass  meetings  to  beat 
the  big  drum.  But  being  attended  only  by  your  own 
party,  they  do  not  bring  votes.  For  bringing  votes, 
ward-meetings,  with  attention  to  the  particular  inter- 
ests or  fancies  of  the  district,  seemed  more  effective. 
I  was  in  England  during  the  great  fight  for  the  Union 


298  REMINISCENCES 

in  1886,  and  being  a  zealous  Unionist  put  myself  at  the 
service  of  the  Unionist  Committee  and  under  its  aus- 
pices took  an  active  part  in  several  elections.  At  one 
of  them  I  went  to  the  Committee-Room  just  before  the 
polling  day,  and  on  asking  what  they  were  going  to  do 
on  that  evening,  was  told  that  they  were  going  to  hold 
a  meeting  in  a  certain  quarter,  in  which,  however,  they 
could  not  hope  to  get  votes,  the  people  being  mechanics 
or  railway  men  who  hated  the  Irish  as  competitors  for 
employment,  and  had  been  convinced  that  if  Home 
Rule  was  carried  the  Irish  would  be  happy  in  their  own 
island  and  would  stay  at  home.  I  went  to  the  meeting  ; 
the  evening  was  fine  ;  and  the  people  from  curiosity  had 
filled  the  hall.  I  opened  the  meeting  and  soon  found 
that  I  had  before  me  an  adverse  audience.  Then  I 
called  to  mind  what  I  had  heard  in  the  morning.  I 
said  that  there  was  one  question  of  the  highest  impor- 
tance which  seemed  to  me  not  to  have  received  suffi- 
cient attention;  which  policy,  Home  Rule  or  Union, 
would  have  the  greater  tendency  to  keep  the  Irish  at 
home?  I  argued  that  Home  Rule  would  frighten 
capital  away  from  Ireland;  that  employment  there 
would  consequently  be  diminished,  and  more  Irish  than 
ever  would  come  over  to  England  and  particularly  to 
that  city.  This  I  turned  backwards  and  forwards  for 
half  an  hour.  From  the  moment  at  which  I  touched 
that  chord  I  was  heard  with  attention;  and  though  I 
concluded  without  a  cheer,  I  understood  afterwards  that 
we  polled  a  number  of  votes  in  that  district,  sufficient, 


y 


4t~ 


Ot^i^/Vwo 


ELECTIONS  299 

the  parties  being  nearly  balanced,  to  turn  the  election. 
I  may  say  this  without  breach  of  modesty,  since  the 
effect  was  due  not  to  my  eloquence,  but  wholly  to  the 
hint  received  in  the  morning,  on  which  I  mechanically 
acted.  Such  are  the  things  which  turn  popular  elec- 
tions. 

In  the  campaign  against  Home  Rule  the  great  difficulty 
and  the  object  of  my  mission  was  to  get  Liberals  who  had 
always  voted  Yellow  to  give  a  Blue  vote  on  the  grand 
issue.  At  one  place  to  which  I  went  there  was  a  leading 
Liberal  whose  presence  at  the  meeting  was  thought  very 
important,  but  who  was  hanging  back.  I  was  sent  to 
persuade  him.  He  pleaded  weakness  which  prevented 
his  attending  a  public  meeting.  But  I  noticed  in  the 
room  a  young  gentleman  evidently  listening  eagerly. 
I  asked  the  gentleman  whether  that  was  his  son,  and^  j 
being  told  he  was,  I  said,  "Then  perhaps  he  would  come  I 
to  represent  you."  The  youth  eagerly  caught  at  the 
proposal,  his  father  was  caught,  and  we  had  the  satis- 
faction of  placing  the  son  in  the  front  of  the  platform 
as  the  representative  of  his  father  unfortunately  de- 
tained by  ill-health. 

Let  me  say  that  my  experience  of  elections  deeply 
impressed  me  with  the  evils  of  the  party  system.  A 
great  issue  like  that  of  the  Union  may  raise  it  for  the 
moment  above  itself.  But  as  a  rule  it  is  immoral  and 
indefensible.  Chatham  was  trying  to  govern  without 
it  when  disease  smote  him  down.  Burke's  attack  on 
Chatham's  government  is  mere  sophistry,  however 


300  REMINISCENCES 

rhetorically  brilliant.  His  object  was  to  get  the  Rock- 
ingham  clique,  with  himself  as  its  manager,  into  power. 
What  is  the  special  "  principle  "  on  which  he  supposes 
his  party  to  be  founded  ? 1  It  is  nothing  but  a  special 
question  with  the  settlement  of  which  the  moral  and 
rational  foundation  for  his  party  will  come  to  an  end. 
The  eloquence  of  Burke  is  unquestionable;  so  is  his 
patriotism ;  so  is  his  political  wisdom  when  his  passions 
are  not  moved  as  they  are  to  the  total  ruin  of  his 
sagacity  and  regard  for  fact  in  his  Essay  on  the 
French  Revolution. 

[x  I  think  the  reference  is  to  "Party  is  a  body  of  men  united,  for 
promoting  by  their  joint  endeavours  the  national  interest,  upon  some 
particular  principle  in  which  they  are  all  agreed."  —  "Thoughts  on 
the  Cause  of  the  Present  Discontents."  Burke's  works.  London: 
Rivington.  1826.  Vol.  II,  p.  335.J , 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

IRELAND 
1862 ;  1881 

Cardwell  as  Irish  Secretary  —  The  Irish  People  —  Irish  Liberals  — 
Crime  in  Ireland  —  Education— Social  Life  —  Robert  Lowe  — 
Second  visit  to  Ireland  —  Lord  O'Hagan  —  Royal  visits  to 
Ireland  —  W.  E.  Forster  —  Gladstone's  Irish  Policy. 

THE  summer  of  1862 1  spent  in  Ireland  with  Cardwell,1 
then  Irish  Secretary,  at  The  Lodge  in  Phoenix  Park. 
Of  all  parks  that  I  ever  saw,  the  Phoenix,  with  its  view 
of  the  Wicklow  Hills,  is  the  most  beautiful.  Yet  it  was 
little  frequented  by  the  citizens  of  Dublin,  who  seemed 
to  prefer  the  streets,  and  left  their  Park  in  a  solitude 
which  fitted  it  to  be  the  scene  of  the  Murders.2  Card- 
well,  being  a  Cabinet  Minister,  was  the  real  ruler.  The 
Lord  Lieutenant,  Lord  Carlisle,3  a  most  amiable  and 
popular  man,  was  happy  in  displaying  his  admirable 
social  qualities  by  making  the  after-dinner  speeches 
in  which,  thanks  to  his  unique  flow  of  heartfelt  flum- 

[l  Edward  Cardwell,  Viscount  Cardwell,  Secretary  to  the  Treas- 
ury, 1845-1846;  President  of  the  Board  of  Trade,  1852-1855; 
Secretary  for  Ireland,  1859-1861 ;  Colonial  Secretary,  1864-1866 ; 
Secretary  for  war,  1868-1874.  Born  1813  ;  died  1886.] 

P  The  reference  is  to  the  murder  of  Lord  Frederick  Charles  Cav- 
endish and  Thomas  Henry  Burke  on  May  the  6th,  1882.] 

[3  George  William  Frederick  Howard,  seventh  Earl  of  Carlisle. 
1802-1864.] 

301 


302  REMINISCENCES 

mery,  he  was  unrivalled,  and  by  occasionally  scoring  at 
cricket. 

The  general  impression,  I  believe,  was  that  Cardwell 
had  failed  as  Irish  Secretary.  It  is  certain  that  he  was 
the  reverse  of  a  typical  Irishman.  To  give  him  an  in- 
sight into  Irish  character  I  had  persuaded  him  before 
he  came  over  to  see  the  "Colleen  Bawn,"  I  fear  with  no 
good  effect.  But  I  do  not  believe  that  he  failed.  His 
patience,  industry,  justice,  and  impartiality  were  ap- 
preciated by  the  best  Irishmen ;  my  inquiries  led  me  to 
believe  that  they  were  appreciated  by  the  people  at 
large;  and  I  came  away  disabused  of  the  belief  that 
roistering  misrule  is  the  only  thing  for  Ireland.  That 
there  is  a  tendency  of  that  sort  in  the  Irish  character 
may  be  true,  but  it  calls  for  an  antidote,  not  for  in- 
dulgence. 

On  Cardwell's  arrival  at  Dublin,  a  list  of  promises 
which  had  been  made  to  supporters  of  the  Government 
was  laid  before  him.  The  staid  English  official  stood 
aghast  when  he  saw  how  much  their  number  exceeded 
the  possibilities  of  performance.  He  was  told  that  he 
need  not  be  uneasy.  A  promise,  even  though  it  could 
not  be  fulfilled,  was  preferred  to  a  refusal.  The  angler 
prefers  a  bite  to  a  perfectly  blank  day. 

I  was  deeply  impressed  with  the  pensive  beauty  of 
Ireland  and  the  weird  melancholy  of  its  relics,  the 
Round  Towers,  the  Seven  Churches  of  Glendalough, 
the  Hill  of  Cashel,  the  ruins  of  the  primeval  seat  of 
learning  at  Clonmacnois.  With  the  historic  pathos 


IRELAND  303 

mingled  the  comic  traits  of  Irish  character;  a  field  with 
grand  iron  portals  and  no  fence;  a  house  with  three 
windows  and  a  flight  of  marble  steps  fit  for  a  mansion  • 
a  magnificent  chimney-piece  with  filthy  walls;  a  fine 
lodge  with  two  pieces  of  timber  laid  across  each 
other  for  a  gate ;  excellent  wines  and  execrable  cookery. 
One  could  faintly  realize  the  old  roaring  and  reckless 
days.  I  had  supposed  the  pig  in  the  family  to  be  a 
satire,  but  found  it  a  reality.  The  people  in  their  pen- 
ury were  light-hearted.  But  I  am  told  they  are  chang- 
ing their  mood  as  well  as  ceasing  to  be  attached  to  their 
social  chiefs.  It  is  said  that  their  simplicity  of  character, 
their  love  of  fun,  and  the  wit,  which  over-leaping  itself 
produced  their  bulls,  have  since  these  stern  political 
struggles  been  passing  away,  and  that  a  more  sombre 
hue  is  coming  over  the  whole  scene. 

At  the  time  of  my  visit  even,  "ould  Ireland,"  with 
its  factions  and  feuds,  the  relics  of  the  clan,  was  hardly 
extinct.  Not  long  before,  the  Government  had  been 
called  upon  to  stop  the  annual  faction-fight  between 
the  two-year-olds  and  three-year-olds,  the  origin  of 
whose  feud  was  lost  in  fabulous  antiquity,  but  was  sup- 
posed to  have  been  a  dispute  about  the  age  of  a  steer. 
In  another  place  two  factions  fought  annually  for  a 
mystic  stone.  The  magistrates,  by  direction  of  the 
Government,  sank  the  stone  in  the  river.  The  two 
factions  combined  in  fishing  it  up,  and  then  fought  for  it. 
Donnybrook  Fair,  however,  had  ceased  to  exist. 

Before  I  left  Ireland  I  came  distinctly  to  two  con- 


304  REMINISCENCES 

elusions.  One  was  that  the  Irish  character,  with  all  its 
defects,  its  unthrift,  recklessness,  lawlessness,  and  love 
of  conspiracy,  was  largely  the  product  of  Irish  history. 
The  other  was  that  Irish  history,  with  all  its  calamities 
and  horrors,  was  the  product  of  untoward  accident 
more  than  of  anybody's  crimes.  I  embodied  these 
conclusions  in  an  essay  on  "  Irish  History  and  Irish 
Character "  *  which,  though  now  superseded  and  for- 
gotten, had  some  novelty  and  some  vogue  at  the  time. 
I  drew  my  inspiration  from  some  of  the  last  of  the 
Irish  Liberals,  constant  intercourse  with  whom  I  en- 
joyed, such  as  Lord  O'Hagan,2  Sir  Alexander  McDon- 
nell,3 the  head  of  the  Education  Department  and  the 
organizer  of  national  education;  Dr.  Russell,4  the  Prin- 
cipal of  Maynooth,  a  most  excellent,  liberal,  and  lovable 
man;  Professor  Simpson  of  Belfast;5  and  a  member 
of  the  Catholic  Hierarchy  whose  name  has  escaped  my 
aged  memory.  All  these  men,  while  they  were  thor- 
oughly patriotic  Irishmen,  were  firmly  attached  to  the 


[l  Oxford  and  London :  J.  H.  and  Jas.  Parker.     1862.] 

[*  Thomas  O'Hagan,  first  Baron  O'Hagan,  Lord  Chancellor  of 
Ireland.  1812-1885.] 

[3  Sir  Alexander  McDonnell,  first  Baronet,  Chief  Clerk  in  the 
Chief  Secretary's  office,  in  Ireland ;  Resident  Commissioner  of  the 
Board  of  Education,  Ireland,  1839-1871.  Born  1794;  died  1875.] 

[4  Charles  William  Russell.     1812-1880.] 

[5  So  the  MS.  But  Mr.  J.  M.  Finnegan,  Secretary  of  the  Queen's 
University  of  Belfast,  writes  to  me  :  "  I  am  afraid  there  must  be 
some  error,  as  there  was  no  Professor  of  this  name  in  Queen's  Col- 
lege, and,  as  far  as  I  can  make  out,  none  of  that  name  in  Belfast." 
—  Perhaps  the  author  means  the  late  Dr.  Maxwell  Simpson,  F.R.S., 
who  was  Professor  of  Chemistry  at  Queen's  College,  Cork.] 


IRELAND  305 

Union.  They  desired  Disestablishment,  and  such  im- 
provement in  the  land  law  as  could  be  made  without 
impairing  the  faith  of  contracts,  as  well  as  certain  sec- 
ondary reforms,  including  better  facilities  for  private- 
bill  legislation  and  perhaps  for  legal  appeals.  But 
from  the  thought  of  dissolving  the  Union  they  all 
recoiled;  and  they  rebuked  me  if  I  said  anything  the 
least  tending  that  way. 

What  is  certain,  to  my  mind,  is  that  the  choice  lies 
between  Legislative  Union  and  Independence.  A 
vassal  Parliament  such  as  Gladstone  proposed  would 
presently  struggle  for  equality  and  freedom.  Before 
the  Union,  when  there  were  two  Parliaments,  the  con- 
nection between  the  two  islands,  and  the  subordina- 
tion of  Ireland  to  England  were  maintained  by  undis- 
guised corruption.  That  state  of  things  nobody  would 
desire  to  revive.  What  the  people  wanted,  as  I  always 
believed,  was  the  land,  which  had  been  the  object  of 
contention  in  every  crisis  of  Irish  history;  and  had 
security  of  tenure,  like  that  of  the  English  copyholder, 
been  given  them,  the  political  agitation,  it  seemed  to 
me,  would  have  subsided ;  it  never  showed  much  force 
apart  from  the  agrarian  movement.  But  I  would  not 
undertake  to  say  how  far  the  spirit  of  nationality  has 
been  evoked  by  the  long  struggle,  or  what  concession 
to  it  may  have  become  unavoidable.  The  worst  of  all 
policies,  however,  it  seems  to  me,  is  Home  Rule,  if 
Home  Rule  means  a  vassal  Parliament. 

Agrarian  murder,  in  other  words  the  war  of  assassi- 


306  REMINISCENCES 

nation  against  the  landlords,  had  barely  ceased.  Land- 
lords were  too  often  absentees ;  —  grinding  the  people 
through  their  agents.  Some  of  the  absentee  estates, 
the  Lansdowne  estates  among  the  number,  were  liber- 
ally managed ;  but  this  did  not  make  up  for  the  absence 
of  the  proprietor  and  the  non-performance  of  his  terri- 
torial duties.  It  was  said  that,  an  agent  having  com- 
plained to  his  absentee  employer  that  his  life  was  in 
danger,  the  employer  replied,  "Tell  them  that  they 
need  not  think  to  intimidate  me  by  shooting  you." 
The  people  were  one  vast  agrarian  conspiracy,  so  that 
conviction  was  impossible.  The  Attorney-General 
could  give  the  Council  an  exact  account  of  an  agrarian 
murder  with  the  names  of  the  murderer  and  of  those 
who  had  been  present.  But  when  it  was  proposed  to 
him  to  prosecute,  his  answer  was,  that  every  one  of  the 
witnesses  would  forswear  himself,  and  thus  his  only 
chance,  that  of  getting  one  of  them  at  a  later  day  to  turn 
King's  evidence,  would  be  lost. 

There  is  risk  in  the  employment  of  detectives.  An 
agrarian  murder  had  been  committed,  and  a  large  re- 
ward was  offered  for  conviction.  Part  of  the  cartridge 
was  picked  up  and  proved  to  be  a  leaf  taken  from  a 
common  school-book.  Suspicion  fixed  on  a  man  in 
the  neighbourhood  who  kept  such  books  for  sale.  A 
detective  got  admission  to  the  house  and  reported  that 
the  book  was  there  and  that  the  fatal  leaf  was  missing. 
The  police  entered  the  house  and  brought  away  the 
book.  The  proof  seemed  clear.  But  before  proceed- 


IRELAND  307 

ing,  the  Attorney-General  suggested  a  reference  to  the 
publisher  of  the  book.  The  publisher's  reply  was  that 
it  was  the  right  book,  but  not  the  right  edition.  The 
detective  had  torn  the  leaf  out  of  the  book  which  he 
found  in  the  house  of  the  suspected  man  to  get  a  con- 
viction and  pocket  the  reward. 

I  visited  Dr.  Russell  at  Maynooth,  and  witnessed 
the  perfection  of  that  system  of  mental  drill  and  of 
isolation  from  every  breath  of  free  opinion  by  which, 
carried  on  through  a  course  of  seven  years,  an  Irish 
peasant  is  turned  into  a  priest  with  no  ideas  but  those 
instilled  by  authority,  and  no  aspiration  but  devotion 
to  his  Church.  The  text-book  was  Suarez,  even  the 
comparatively  liberal  Aquinas  being  disused.  When, 
to  such  a  training,  celibacy  and  corporate  influence  was 
superadded,  it  was  easy  to  understand  how  the  Church 
kept  so  complete  a  hold  on  her  clergy  and  why  apostasy 
was  so  rare.  Sir  Alexander  McDonnell  and  all  my 
Protestant  friends  bore  emphatic  testimony  to  the 
purity  of  the  Irish  priesthood. 

A  peasant  clergy  sympathized  with  the  peasantry  in 
political  and  agrarian  struggles.  The  Hierarchy, 
mingling  socially  with  the  upper  classes,  were  more 
conservative,  and  it  seemed  to  me  would  have  dis- 
countenanced Fenianism  altogether  if  they  had  not 
been  dependent  on  their  people  for  their  incomes. 
The  policy  of  payment,  ascribed  to  Pitt,  would  no  doubt 
have  had  its  effect.  The  people,  however,  could  keep 
their  secrets  from  the  priesthood.  Dr.  Russell  told 


308  REMINISCENCES 

me  that  they  had  no  idea  they  had  any  Fenians  in  the 
village  of  Maynooth  till,  one  of  the  abortive  risings 
having  taken  place,  a  number  left  the  village  to  join  it. 

At  the  time  of  my  visit  the  issue  was  national  educa- 
tion, which  afforded  a  field  for  the  liberalism  of  Bishop 
Moriarty *  and  Catholics  of  his  school.  Of  the  Catholic 
laity  not  a  few  were  at  heart  with  the  Government. 
Some  would  come  up  the  back  stairs  and  promise  their 
support  so  long  as  the  Government  showed  perfect 
respect  for  their  Church. 

The  religious  war  between  Catholics  and  Protestants 
was  not  over.  The  two  denominations  of  Christians 
were  still  breaking  each  other's  heads  at  Belfast. 
Protestant  challenges  to  controversy  uncomplimentary 
to  the  Virgin  and  the  Saints  were  posted  on  the  walls. 
In  making  up  dinner-parties  at  The  Lodge  it  was  neces- 
sary to  take  care  how  members  of  the  hostile  Churches 
were  confronted  with  each  other. 

The  mainstay  of  order  was  the  Constabulary,  a  noble 
body  of  men,  whether  the  policy  of  which  they  were  the 
bodyguard  was  wise  or  not.  The  Constabulary  was 
Protestant ;  but  the  ordinary  police  was  largely  Roman 
Catholic.  Yet  it  was  trustworthy ;  loyalty  to  the  corps 
prevailing  over  religious  feeling.  The  Irishman  seems 
to  be  fond  of  Government  service  and  faithful  to  its 
uniform. 

There  were  some  relics  of  the  old  convivial  days.  At 
the  dinner  parties  in  the  Vice-regal  Lodge,  when  the 
I1  David  Moriarty,  Bishop  of  Kerry.  1814-1877.] 


IRELAND  309 

ladies  left  the  room,  the  servants  remained,  and  as  soon 
as  you  put  down  your  glass  they  refilled  it.  I  thought 
I  saw  some  effects  of  this  generous  hospitality. 

The  Horse  Fair  at  Ballinasloe  disappointed  me.  So 
did  not  the  Cashel  steeplechases,  to  see  which  I  unsenti- 
mentally  gave  up  Killarney.  Tipperary  trooped  into 
Cashel  with  its  swallow-tail  coats  of  frieze,  its  tall  hats, 
and  shillelahs.  The  races  were  excellent,  and  the  course 
was  so  chosen  that  from  a  rising  ground  you  could  see 
them  well.  The  enthusiasm  of  the  people  was  delight- 
ful. Mounted  police  were  riding  about  to  keep  order, 
and  late  in  the  day  there  seemed  to  be  some  need  of 
them.  Has  the  chilling  influence  of  politics  now  been 
cast  over  the  race-course  at  Cashel  ? 

There  were  guests  at  The  Lodge  in  Phoenix  Park, 
among  them  was  Sir  John  Lawrence,1  afterwards 
Governor-General  of  India,  in  all  the  simplicity  of  true 
greatness.  I  asked  his  opinion  of  the  competition- 
wallahs,  the  nickname  given  to  the  civil  servants 
appointed  under  the  then  new  system  of  competitive 
examination.  Of  all  men  I  thought  he  was  the  least 
likely  to  put  literary  above  practical  qualifications. 
He  gave  sentence,  however,  in  favour  of  the  wallahs, 
saying  that  when  another  officer  of  Government  wrote 
to  him  about  them  in  a  disparaging  strain,  his  reply 
was,  that  he  would  be  glad  to  exchange. 

Robert   Lowe,    afterwards   Lord   Sherbrooke,2  was 

p  Afterwards  Baron  Lawrence.     1811-1879.] 

[2  Robert  Lowe,  first  Viscount  Sherbrooke,  a  politician  in  New 
South  Wales,  1843-1850;  M.P.  in  England,  1852-1874;  held  many 
high  political  posts.  Born  1811 ;  died  1892.] 


310  REMINISCENCES 

there  for  some  time  with  his  wife.  Plim  I  had  already 
known  well.  There  is  a  memoir  of  him  written  under 
the  auspices  of  the  second  wife,1  whose  affection  soothed 
his  spirit  in  his  old  age.  The  fame  of  the  man  who 
made  the  last  great  stand  in  favour  of  middle-class 
government  against  democracy  can  hardly  have  died 
away.  It  was  not  for  aristocracy  that  he  fought; 
though  an  intense  aristocrat  of  intellect,  he  was  in 
nothing  else  aristocratic;  but  for  government  by  the 
educated  against  government  by  the  masses.  He 
had  perhaps  seen  the  rough  side  of  democracy  in  New 
South  Wales,  where  for  some  years  he  had  practised 
Law  at  a  time  before  the  convict  taint  had  been  thor- 
oughly worked  off.  I  forget  whether  it  was  he  or  one 
of  his  friends  who  at  a  Ball  at  Government  House  had 
the  misfortune  to  tread  upon  and  tear  the  gorgeous 
dress  of  a  lady.  The  fair  wearer  turned  upon  the  cul- 
prit with  an  expression  of  her  wounded  feelings  which 
cannot  with  any  approach  to  decency  be  repeated. 
It  was  a  bitter  moment  for  Robert  Lowe  when,  Glad- 
stone's Reform  Bill  having  been  thrown  out  mainly  by 
his  efforts,  and  the  Liberal  Ministry  having  thus  been 
overturned,  Disraeli  brought  in  a  Bill 2  not  less  demo- 
cratic than  that  of  Gladstone,  and  the  Conservative 

f1  This  must  refer  to  the  "Life  and  Letters  of  the  Right  Honour- 
able Robert  Lowe  Viscount  Sherbrooke,  G.C.B.,  D.C.L.,  etc.  With 
a  Memoir  of  Sir  John  Coape  Sherbrooke,  C.G.B.,  Sometime  Gov- 
ernor-General of  Canada."  By  A.  Patchett  Martin.  London : 
Longmans,  Green,  and  Co.,  1893 ;  for  it  is  dedicated  to  Caroline, 
Viscountess  Sherbrooke.] 

[2  March  18,  1867.] 


IRELAND  311 

rank  and  file,  who  had  rapturously  applauded  Lowe's 
anti-democratic  speeches,  sat,  under  the  rod  of  party 
discipline,  sullenly  supporting  the  Bill  and  deaf  to  the 
passionate  appeals  which  Lowe  made  to  them.  It 
was  said  that  he  was  moved  to  tears. 

Lowe  was  an  albino,  with  eyes  so  weak  that  when  he 
was  reading  his  nose  literally  touched  his  book.  He 
took  high  honours  at  Oxford,  and  it  is  said  would  have 
taken  higher  if  he  had  not  rubbed  out  with  his  nose 
what  he  had  written  with  his  pen.  Yet  I  have  been 
driven  by  him  in  a  phaeton  at  a  rattling  pace  through 
crowded  streets. 

In  public,  Lowe  affected  a  utilitarian  contempt  for 
classical  education;  in  private  he  was  always  reading 
the  classics.  When  I  was  staying  with  him  at  Cater- 
ham  he  asked  me  what  I  thought  was  the  best  history 
of  the  Roman  Republic.  I  told  him  Mommsen's,1 
which  had  just  appeared.  A  few  days  afterwards  an 
editorial  in  a  leading  newspaper  for  which  he  wrote- 
began,  "In  Mr.  Thompson's  history  of  the  Roman 
Republic,  which  appears  to  us  to  be  the  best."  I 
wonder  whether  booksellers  received  orders  for  the 
book ! 

Lowe  was  the  most  naturally  and  spontaneously 
brilliant  talker  that  I  ever  knew.  Other  great  talkers 
wanted  an  audience.  Lowe  did  not.  He  was  not  less 

[^'Romische  Geschichte."  By  Theodor  Mommsen.  An  Eng- 
lish translation  (in  five  volumes)  was  made  by  the  Rev.  William  P. 
Dickson,  and  published  by  Richard  Bentley,  London,  in  1867.] 


312  REMINISCENCES 

likely  to  say  a  good  thing  to  you  as  you  sat  by  him  on 
the  driving-box  than  to  say  it  to  the  most  appreciative 
circle.  Touch  him  when  you  would,  he  gave  out  the 
electric  spark.  His  talk  was  rather  cynical  and  sar- 
donic in  form;  but  he  was  not  really- a  cynic;  he  was 
a  Democritus  who  laughed  at  the  world ;  though  rather 
too  impatient  of  honest  stupidity.  "Look  at  that 
fool  throwing  away  his  natural  advantages ! "  he 
exclaimed  when  a  deaf  member  of  the  House  of  Com- 
mons put  up  his  ear  trumpet. 

Mrs.  Lowe  was  a  fat,  good-natured  lady,  clever  in 
her  way,  for  she  painted  well,  and  an  excellent  wife, 
but  rather  a  joke  among  her  friends.  Her  husband, 
though  he  loved  her  dearly,  sometimes  could  not  help 
making  fun  of  her.  One  morning  at  breakfast  he  was 
railing  in  his  dashing  way  at  the  marriage  service  of  the 
Church  of  England:  "It  made  me"  -turning  to  his 
wife — "say  'With  all  my  worldly  goods  I  thee  endow/ 
when  I  had  no  worldly  goods  to  endow  you  with." 

"Ah!  Robert;  but  then  there  were  your  brains." 

"Well,  all  the  world  knows  I  did  not  endow  you  with 
them." 

Spreading  his  arms  to  help  her  spacious  person  down 
from  a  jaunting-car,  he  exclaimed,  "Descend,  ye  Nine ! " 
Combative  he  certainly  was,  and  he  had  at  least  his 
fair  share  of  foes.  The  "Whitehead  torpedo"  was  his 
nickname.1  A  party  of  us,  including  the  old  Lord 

[l  "Lord  Beaconsfield's  mind  being  now  exclusively  turned  upon 
military  matters,  there  has  occurred  to  him  a  new  and  happy  name 


IRELAND  313 

Chancellor  Cranworth,1  went  to  see  Powerscourt  water- 
fall. Our  cars  brought  us  back  to  the  station  some 
time  before  the  arrival  of  the  train.  To  fill  up  the  time 
Lowe  said,  "Let  us  have  a  row  with  the  car-men  about 
the  fare."  A  row  it  actually  became,  and  the  Lord 
Chancellor  looked  the  picture  of  dismay.  Lowe  prized 
intellect  above  all  things,  in  others  and  in  himself.  At 
the  time  when  his  own  powerful  mind  was  giving  way, 
and  had  painfully  betrayed  its  decadence  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  we  met  at  an  Academy  dinner.  Lowe 
took  me  to  see  a  picture  at  which  he  had  just  been  look- 
ing and  admired.  He  failed  to  identify  it,  and  he  burst 
into  tears. 

Twenty  years  afterwards 2  I  was  in  Ireland  again, 
presiding  over  a  section  of  the  Social  Science  Associa- 
tion at  Dublin.  This  time  I  was  the  guest  of  my  friend 
the  ex-Chancellor,  Lord  O'Hagan.  If  the  Irish  ques- 
tion could  only  have  been  put  into  the  hands  of  a  few 
men  like  him  for  quiet  settlement,  instead  of  being  made 
the  prey  of  demagogism  and  the  football  of  party, 
how  much  better  would  the  result  have  been,  and  how 
much  less  the  public  morality  and  the  faith  of  contracts 
have  suffered  in  the  process ! 

Lord  O'Hagan's  political  saint  was  Arthur  O'Leary,3 

for  his  old  adversary,  Lowe.  He  alludes  to  him  in  private  conver- 
sation as  'The  Whitehead  Torpedo.' "  —  "A  Diary  of  Two  Parlia- 
ments." By  Henry  W.  Lucy.  The  Disraeli  Parliament.  1874- 
1880.  Second  edition.  Cassell  and  Co.  1885.  Under  date  April  16, 
1878.] 

f1  Robert  Monsey  Rolfe,  Baron  Cranworth.     1790-1868.] 

P  October,  1881.]          [3  Irish  priest  and  politician.    1729-1802.] 


314  REMINISCENCES 

whose  portrait  hung  in  his  study,  and  whose  policy  was 
union  with  justice.  It  has  recently  been  discovered 
that  O'Leary  was  in  communication  with  the  Govern- 
ment, and  received  money  from  it.  This  would  have 
been  a  shock  to  O'Hagan.  But  there  is  no  reason  to 
suspect  the  sincerity  of  O'Leary's  convictions  or  to 
reverse  any  opinion  as  to  the  soundness  of  his  views. 
Nothing  that  has  transpired  warrants  us  in  calling  him 
a  spy. 

There  was  no  excuse  for  the  neglect  of  Ireland  by 
the  Court  during  the  late  reign.1  The  Queen,  when 
she  paid  a  brief  visit,  was  received  as  enthusiastically 
as  she  could  desire.  That  the  probable  effect  of  her 
presence  has  been  somewhat  overrated  is  not  unlikely, 
but  her  persistent  absence  was  felt  as  a  standing  affront. 
Royalty  must  be  charitably  judged,  since  it  is  inevitably 
nursed  in  delusion.  The  claims  of  duty  are  never 
brought  home  to  it.  It  is  made  to  feel  by  flattery  that 
the  gratification  of  its  own  whims  is  a  public  duty. 
There  was,  however,  in  this  case  an  uneasy  conscious- 
ness of  the  omission.  I  believe  I  heard  it  on  good 
authority  that  an  Irish  Lord-in- Waiting  who  had  rashly 
touched  the  tender  point  received  a  message  which 
caused  him  to  resign. 

At  the  close  of  the  Convention  I  had  to  propose  a 

vote  of  thanks  to  a  scientific  society  which  had  given 

us  a  breakfast  in  the  Phoenix  Park.     I  said  that  the 

Phoenix  Park  seemed  to  me  by  its  beauty  to  be  not  less 

I1  That  is,  the  reign  of  Queen  Victoria.] 


IRELAND  315 

worthy  of  the  occasional  residence  of  Royalty  than 
Osborne  or  Balmoral.  The  sentiment  was  cheered. 
In  the  evening  there  was  a  banquet  at  the  Mansion 
House  at  which  the  Lord-Mayor  echoed  what  I  had 
said  in  the  morning.  Prince  Teck,1  who  was  a  guest, 
followed  suit,  with  a  strong  expression  of  his  regret 
that  the  Royal  family  did  not  come  more  to  Ireland; 
"and  why  they  do  not,  I  don't  know  why."  This  of 
course  made  a  sensation,  and  was  echoed  by  the  morn- 
ing papers.  The  Prince  then  knew  that  he  had  of- 
fended, and  an  attempt  to  mop  him  up  was  made,  I 
believe,  in  one  of  the  evening  papers,  but  with  the 
usual  result.  Presently  out  came  a  long  editorial, 
evidently  inspired,  in  the  Times,  taking  me,  poor  inno- 
cent as  I  was,  to  task  for  having  given  expression  to 
what  was  called  the  paradoxical  notion  that  it  would 
be  a  good  thing  for  the  Court  to  visit  Ireland,  and 
demonstrating  by  arguments  which  seemed  to  me 
rather  paradoxical  that  such  a  step  would  be  most 
unwise.  Afterwards  the  Prince  of  Wales 2  referred  to 
the  question  in  a  public  speech,  though  in  language  per- 
fectly kind  towards  his  old  teacher,  showing  thereby 
how  sore  the  subject  was. 

Among  the  Company  at  O'Hagan's  was  a  very  pleas- 
ant and  well-informed  man  whom  I  did  not  know, 
but  who,  I  afterwards  learned,  was  a  leading  writer  in 

p  H.  S.  H.  Francis  Paul  Charles  Louis  Alexander,  Prince  and 
Duke  of  Teck,  son  of  Duke  Alexander  of  Wiirtemberg,  born  1837. 
Father  of  Her  Majesty,  our  present  Queen.] 

P  Afterwards  King  Edward  VII.] 


316  REMINISCENCES 

the  Times.  As  he  and  I  strolled  in  the  grounds  one 
morning,  our  conversation  turned  on  the  subject  of 
the  Royal  neglect  of  Ireland,  and  I  spoke  of  George  IV's 
visit  as  a  redeeming  point  in  his  unedifying  career. 
My  companion  heartily  concurred.  It  may  have  been 
\s  my  fancy,  but  I  thought  that  in  the  editorial  taking  the 
other  side  I  identified  a  phrase  which  had  been  used 
in  that  morning's  conversation. 

This  was  the  time  of  the  struggle  with  Parnell  and 
his  Nationalist  following.  Things  had  come  to  such  a 
pass  that  some  who  did  not  sympathize  with  the  League 
were  joining  it  to  obtain  for  their  callings  the  protec- 
tion which  the  Queen's  Government  could  no  longer 
afford.  The  Irish  Secretary  and  the  occupant  of  The 
Lodge  was  another  friend  of  mine,  W.  E.  Forster,1  an 
able,  honest,  solid,  and  most  industrious,  though  rather 
uncouth  man,  who,  it  was  thought,  with  a  little  grace 
and  polish  might  have  achieved  to  the  highest  place. 
In  grace  and  polish,  however,  he  was  totally  wanting. 
I  have  seen  him  in  speaking  stand  for  some  time  on 
one  leg  holding  up  a  glass  of  water  in  one  hand  as  if 
he  were  going  to  drink  it  to  the  health  of  the  audience. 
He  was  fighting  the  Parnellites  with  a  Coercion  Bill 
in  hourly  danger  of  assassination,  as  was  subsequently 
proved. 

I  wrote  something  in  defence  of  Forster's  application 
of  the  Coercion  Act,  saying  that  one  of  three  things 

f1  William  Edward  Forster ;  liberal  M.P.  for  Bradford,  1861- 
1886  ;  held  several  high  political  posts.  1818-1886.] 


IRELAND  317 

had  to  be  done;  either  the  Coercion  Act  must  be 
applied;  or  the  troops  must  fire;  or  the  Queen's 
Government  in  Ireland,  as  it  could  no  longer  protect 
people  in  their  lawful  callings,  must  resign.  Forster 
soon  after  came  over  to  England.  When  we  met  he 
thanked  me  for  my  defence  of  him,  but  said  that  a  dif- 
ferent policy  had  prevailed.  From  his  tone  I  augured 
that  he  was  about  to  resign,  as  a  day  or  two  afterwards 
he  did. 

Peel,  when  he  changed,  averred  his  change,  and  gave 
credit  to  those  who  had  converted  him.  Gladstone 
set  his  retrospective  imagination  at  work  to  make  out 
that  he  had  always  been  consistent.  If,  as  he  pre- 
tended in  his  "  Plistory  of  an  Idea,"  1  his  mind  had  many 
years  before  been  turning  towards  Home  Rule,  how 
could  he  justify  himself  in  continuing  to  lead  the  nation 
on  what  he  had  begun  to  suspect  was  a  wrong  line,  in 
denouncing  Parnell  as  "wading  through  rapine  to  dis- 
memberment"; in  proclaiming  his  arrest  to  a  shouting 
multitude  at  Guildhall;  in  throwing  him  and  his  fol- 
lowers into  prison;  above  all  in  allowing  his  own  col- 
leagues, especially  his  Home  Secretary,  to  rise  at  his 
side  night  after  night  and  denounce  the  Home  Rule 
movement  and  its  leader  in  most  scathing  terms? 
Is  it  possible  by  any  stretch  of  charity  to  doubt  that 
Gladstone's  failure  in  1885  to  obtain  a  majority  inde- 
pendent of  the  Parnellites  was  the  proximate  cause  of 
his  sudden  accession  to  Home  Rule  ?  That  he  should 

I1  Published  in  August,  1886.] 


318  REMINISCENCES 

have  persuaded  himself  of  the  contrary  is  only  one  of 
the  many  proofs  that  his  power  of  self-deception  was 
unbounded.  It  is  not  less  true  that  his  emotions  were 
generous  and  that  his  enthusiasm  when  once  he  had 
espoused  any  cause  was  perfectly  real. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR 
1861-1865 

Secession — Its  True  Character — Lincoln's  View  —  The  Alabama 
Claim  —  Attitude  of  the  British  Government  —  British  Liberals 
—  Visits  to  the  United  States  —  Friends  in  the  United  States  — 
J.  M.  Forbes  —  Emerson  —  Lowell  —  Bancroft  —  The  Attitude 
of  the  North  —  Finance  —  General  Butler  —  The  Opposing 
Forces  —  General  Grant  —  Sherman  —  General  Meade  —  Lee  — 
General  Butler  again — Washington — Seward — Abraham  Lincoln. 

IN  1861  came  Secession,  and  what  was  taken  to  be 
the  death-knell  of  the  American  Republic.  The 
aristocratic  and  wealthy  classes  in  England  generally, 
exulting  in  the  downfall  of  democracy,  at  once  em- 
braced the  side  of  the  South.  A  short  time  before 
they  had  given  an  ovation  to  the  authoress  of  "  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin."  But  that  was  when  slavery  was  the 
reproach  of  the  Republic. 

Classes  will  be  classes.  The  success  of  American 
democracy  had  always  been  a  threat  to  aristocracy  in 
England.  But  the  people  in  England  generally  would 
not  have  been  without  excuse  if  they  had  gone  wrong. 
Slavery  was  accursed ;  it  was  under  the  ban  of  human- 
ity; England  had  made  great  efforts  and  sacrifices 
for  its  extinction.  Its  extension,  which  would  probably 
have  ensued  on  the  slave-owners'  victory,  would  have 

319 


320  REMINISCENCES 

been  the  bane  of  moral  civilization.  On  this  account, 
and  on  this  account  only,  was  any  one  bound  to  take 
the  side  of  the  North.  With  a  war  for  the  reconquest 
of  a  new-born  nation,  severed  from  the  Northern  States 
by  a  natural  line  of  cleavage  after  a  long  period  of 
internal  strife,  we  should  in  no  way  have  been  called 
upon  to  sympathize.  But  on  slavery  Congress,  Lin- 
coln, and  Seward  had  disclaimed  any  intention  of 
making  war,  and  Congress  had  offered  to  perpetuate 
its  constitutional  existence  if  the  Slave  States  would 
return  to  the  Union.  We  who  took  the  side  of  the 
North  had  to  contend  that  the  formal  was  not  the  prac- 
tical issue,  and  to  make  the  masses  see  this  was  not  easy, 
especially  when  the  masses,  by  the  cutting  off  of  cot- 
ton, were  being  stinted  of  their  bread.  Mr.  Spence,1  in 
his  cunning  book,  had  propagated  the  notion  that  the 
real  issue  was  economical,  and  that  the  South  was  for 
Free  Trade ;  as  it  was,  though  not  from  enlightenment, 
but  because  slavery  could  not  manufacture.  Cobden, 
as  I  have  said,  wavered  at  first,  though  he  soon  came 
round  to  the  truth.  Bright  came  out  at  once  for  the 
North,  and  delivered  in  St.  James's  Hall  the  best  speech 
I  ever  heard.  All  things  considered,  the  conduct  of 
the  British  people  was  surely  good.  The  partisans  of 

P  James  Spence,  of  Liverpool.  "The  American  Union;  its 
Effect  on  National  Character  and  Policy,  with  an  Inquiry  into 
Secession  as  a  Constitutional  Right,  and  the  Causes  of  the  Disrup- 
tion." London.  1861.  —  Also,  "On  the  Recognition  of  the  Southern 
Confederation. ' '  London.  1862.  —  Also  ' '  Southern  Independence  : 
an  Address."  London :  Bentley.  1863.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  321 

the  South,  though  they  spat  a  good  deal  of  fire  and 
had  the  mighty  Times  on  their  side,  never  ventured, 
in  Parliament  or  elsewhere,  to  make  a  decided  move  in 
favour  of  intervention.  Lincoln,  with  all  his  wisdom 
and  goodness  of  heart,  never  took  —  or  at  least  never 
showed  that  he  took  —  a  right  view  of  the  case  with 
which  he  had  to  deal;  if  he  had,  perhaps  there  would 
have  been  no  war.  He  viewed  and  treated  as  a  rebel-  { 
lion  that  which  was  in  fact  a  natural  disruption,  post- 
poned for  some  time  by  uneasy  shifts  and  compromises, 
but  inevitable  in  the  end.  This  same  error  pervaded 
Reconstruction.  It  led  to  the  fatal  exclusion  of  the 
Southern  leaders  from  the  work  of  Reconstruction,  to 
Carpet-bagging  government,  to  the  Ku-Klux,  and  to 
the  almost  desperate  situation  which  has  ensued.  It  • 
is  true  that  Lincoln's  personal  character  and  history 
were,  to  those  who  knew  them,  a  pledge  for  the  adop-  ^ 
tion  of  the  antislavery  policy  if  victory  rested  with  his  1 
party;  but  by  us  in  England  Lincoln's  character  and  ? 
history  were  unknown,  and  his  official  utterances  were  ) 
naturally  taken  as  decisive. 

The  great  writers  having  generally  gone  with  their 
class,  my  pen  was  in  requisition  on  the  side  of  the  North. 
It  is  true,  as  J.  M.  Forbes  is  recorded  in  his  daughter's 
Memoir  l  of  him  to  have  noted,  that  I  somewhat  hesi- 
tated at  first.  It  seemed  hardly  our  business  to  fan 
the  flame  of  civil  war  in  another  nation.  But  I  also 

[l  "  Letters  and  Recollections  of  John  Murray  Forbes."     Edited 
by  his  Daughter,  Sarah  Forbes  Hughes.     Boston  and  New  York : 
Houghton  Mifflin  Co.   1899.     Volume  II,  page  108.] 
Y 


322  REMINISCENCES 

felt  a  doubt,  which  in  the  sequel  has  proved  not  base- 
less, about  the  policy  of  reincorporating  the  Slave 
States.  The  first  ground  of  hesitation  was  removed  by 
the  efforts  of  the  South  to  draw  us  into  the  quarrel. 

JThe  second  was  swept  away  by  the  progress  of  the  war, 
which  left  us  practically  to  choose  between  the  victory 
of  freedom  and  that  of  slavery. 

My  first  appearance  on  a  platform  was  at  a  great 
meeting  in  the  Free  Trade  Hall  at  Manchester,  called, 
upon  the  escape  of  the  Alabama,  to  protest  against  the 
fitting  out;  of  "cruisers  for  the  South.  The  meeting  was 
called  by  the  Union  League,  an  organization  at  the 
head  of  which  was  Thomas  Potter,1  one  of  the  leaders 
of  Manchester  commerce,  and  a  brand  plucked  from 
the  burning;  for  Manchester  magnates  generally  leant 
to  the  other  side.  At  that  moment  we  were  seriously 
alarmed.  Other  cruisers  were  being  built  in  Laird's 
yard,  and  a  party,  of  which  the  present  Lord  Salisbury,2 
then  Lord  Robert  Cecil,  was  an  active  member,  were 
working  to  prevent  their  arrest.  Too  strong  language 
was  used  by  me  and  others  at  that  crisis.  When  all 
was  known,  the  Government  was  seen  to  have  been 
guilty  only  of  allowing  the  papers  to  lie  too  long  before 
the  Queen's  Advocate,  who  it  did  not  know  had  been 
suddenly  stricken  with  illness.  The  order  for  the  arrest 
of  the  Alabama  was  on  its  way  when  she  sailed,  without 


t1  Thomas  Bayley  Potter.     1817-1898.] 

[2  This,  oiiMifMMe,  refers  to  the  third  Marquess  of  Salisbury, 
father  of  the  present  Marquess.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL^WAR  323 

a  clearance,  on  a  pretended  trip  of  pleasure.  She 
took  on  board  her  armament  from  a  tender  at  the 
Azores.  There  was  one  seaman  of  the  Reserve  in  her 
crew,  but  Government  had  no  general  control  over  the 
engagements  of  those  men.  Allowance  must  be  made 
for  a  Government  responsible  for  very  scattered  pos- 
sessions and  exposed  for  four  years  to  the  strain  of 
maintaining  a  neutrality  which  the  South  was  always 
trying  to  break.  Nations  which,  instead  of  settling 
their  differences  by  negotiation  or  arbitration,  disturb 
the  neighbourhood  by  going  to  war,  must  be  content 
with  reasonable  maintenance  of  an  honest  neutrality. 
The  Government  of  the  United  States  had  no  shadow 
of  justification  for  making  war  on  Spain  other  than  the 
trouble  to  which  it  was  put  in  maintaining  the  neutrality 
between  the  Spaniards  and  the  insurgent  Cubans, 
though  the  enforcement  was  not  very  strict,  filibuster- 
ing expeditions  having  escaped,  and  Cuban  revolution 
having  been  allowed  freely  to  operate  at  New  York. 
I  was  glad  when  the  indemnities  were  paid  by  the  Brit- 
ish Government,  because  the  payment  plucked  out  a 
thorn.  But  I  doubt  whether  they  were  due ;  I  feel  sure 
that,  in  any  case  but  that  of  the  Alabama,  they  were 
not. 

I  lived  with  those  who  could  not  be  misinformed,  and 
my  conviction  is  that  the  British  Government  remained 
throughout  unshaken  in  its  neutrality,  and  never  for 
a  moment  gave  ear  either  to  the  solicitations  of  the 
South  or  to  the  promptings  of  the  Emperor  of  the 


324  REMINISCENCES 

French.  Palmerston  was  a  Tory,  and  his  heart  may 
have  been  with  the  Southern  oligarchy.  On  the 
Trent  affair  he  drafted  a  despatch,  instinct  with  his 
overbearing  temper,  which  was  happily  modified  by 
the  Prince  Consort.  But  he  was  deeply  pledged  to  the 
extinction  of  slavery.  About  the  course  of  the  Duke 
of  Argyll,  Cornewall  Lewis,  or  Cardwell,  there  could 
be  no  doubt.  Of  Gladstone's  course  and  his  motives 
for  it  I  have  already  spoken.  In  him  there  may  have 
been  a  tincture  of  Liverpool.1  But  he  sympathized 
with  all  struggles  for  independence.  In  a  letter  to  me 
he  suggested  that  if  the  North  would  let  the  South  go, 
Canada  might  afterwards  be  allowed  to  enter  the  Union. 
I  suppressed  the  letter,  which  I  thought  would  be  of 
little  use  at  the  time  and  might  afterwards  do  him  harm. 
Though  he  said,  and  had  the  fact  on  his  side  in  saying, 
that  Jeff  Davis  had  made  a  nation,  it  did  not  follow 
that  he  voted  for  intervention  in  the  Cabinet.  I  feel 
sure  that  he  did  not.  For  mediation  the  British  Gov- 
ernment was  always  ready,  as  well  it  might  be,  con- 
sidering the  loss  and  suffering  to  which  the  war  was 
exposing  its  people. 

The  British  Government  was  upbraided  for  recogniz- 
ing the  belligerency  of  the  South.  Did  not  the  North 
from  the  outset  recognize  the  belligerency  of  the  South 
and  treat  its  soldiers  as  entitled  to  all  the  laws,  human- 
ities, and  courtesies  of  war  ?  It  called  the  South  rebels ; 


1  Robert  Banks  Jenkinson,  second  Earl  of  Liverpool.     1770- 


/ 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  325 

but  did  it,  during  the  war,  ever  treat  a  single  South- 
erner as  a  rebel  ? 

Had  the  French  Emperor  chosen,  in  pursuance  of 
his  own  designs,  to  intervene  on  the  side  of  the  South, 
England  could  not  have  been  permitted  to  intervene 
on  the  side  of  the  North.  The  opposition  would  have 
been  far  too  strong.  It  is  not  unlikely  that  the  North 
owed  a  good  deal  to  the  attitude  of  Russia,  whatever 
the  motive  of  that  attitude  may  have  been. 

At  this  critical  time  we  were  unlucky  in  our  Foreign 
Minister.  Lord  Russell's  diplomatic  manner  was  as 
bad  as  possible.  It  was  haughty,  unconciliatory,  and 
brusque.  His  appointment  to  the  Ministry  of  Foreign 
Affairs  was  a  striking  instance  of  the  tendency  of  party 
Government,  in  distributing  the  high  offices  among 
the  party  leaders,  to  put  the  square  man  in  the  round 
hole.  He  apologized  for  his  want  of  courtesy  frankly, 
but  late.  We  were  lucky,  on  the  other  hand,  in  having, 
as  the  American  Ambassador,  Mr.  Adams,1  whose  bear- 
ing throughout  was  excellent,  and  who,  to  the  pride  of 
aristocracy,  could  oppose  the  dignity  of  an  illustrious 
line.  Mr.  Adams'  temper  must  have  been  tried.  He 
certainly  was  not  exposed  during  those  years  to  the 
social  allurements,  under  the  sweet  but  emasculating 
influence  of  which  American  Ambassadors  to  England 
are  apt  to  fall. 

In  the  course  of  the  struggle  I  spent  some  pleasant 

[l  Charles  Francis  Adams,  United  States  Minister  to  England. 
1861-1868.] 


326  REMINISCENCES 

days  with  Thomas  Potter  at  his  house,  Buel  Hill,  near 
Manchester,  and  enjoyed  the  advantage  of  seeing  the 
life  of  a  great  centre  of  industry  and  of  intercourse 
with  Manchester  men.  Potter  in  those  days  was  very 
opulent.  His  grapery  was  famous,  and  on  New  Year's 
Day  we  eat  the  grapes  of  the  old  and  those  of  the  new 
year  off  the  same  dish.  He  stood  nearly  alone  among 
the  magnates  of  Manchester  on  the  side  of  the  North. 
With  most  of  them  Cotton  was  King. 

My  acquaintance  with  the  land  of  manufactures 
extended.  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  it  at  Bradford,  as  the 
guest  of  my  very  dear  friends  Robert  and  Samuel  Kell,1 
and  afterwards  at  Rochdale,  where  Bright's  home  and 
works  were,  Nottingham,  and  Leeds.  Machinery  has 
added  vastly  to  the  wealth,  would  we  could  say  with 
confidence  to  the  happiness,  of  the  world.  Factory 
hands  are  human  hammers  and  spindles ;  they  can  feel 
no  interest  in  their  work ;  they  do  not  even  see  it  in  its 

p  Robert  and  Samuel  Kell  were  prosperous  cloth  manufacturers 
of  Bradford,  their  firm's  name  being  Schwann,  Kell,  and  Company. 
Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  tells  me  that  they  were  "ardent  Radicals, 
Free  Church  and  Social  Reform  enthusiasts ;  men  of  great  weight 
and  high  character  amongst  the  Yorkshire  Reformers  of  the  sixties 
and  seventies ;  stout  supporters  of  Edward  Miall,  Alfred  Illing- 
worth,  etc."  —  Samuel  Copeland  Kell,  the  elder  brother,  was  born 
in  1812  and  died  at  Bradford  on  May  the  20th,  1869 ;  Robert  died  on 
December  the  13th,  1894.  They  were  sons  of  the  Rev.  Robert  Kell, 
a  Unitarian  minister.  The  Bradford  Observer  of  December  the  14th, 
1894,  contains  a  long  and  sympathetic  obituary  notice  of  Robert, 
who  seems  to  have  been  the  more  prominent  and  influential.  — 
For  much  of  this  information  I  am  indebted  to  widespread  inquiries 
instituted  through  the  courtesy  of  Mr.  J.  Rankine  Finlayson,  of 
Manchester.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  327 

finished  state ;  their  abodes  are  dismal ;  their  lives  are 
monotonous.  They  can  hardly  be  blamed  either  for 
addiction  to  sensual  enjoyments  or  for  readiness  to 
listen  to  any  Karl  Marx  who  tells  them  that  they  ought 
to  have  more  pay.  Socially  they  are  quite  cut  off 
from  their  employers,  whose  mansions,  perhaps,  •  in 
their  Sunday  stroll  in  the  suburbs,  they  see  with  no 
friendly  eye.  Anything  that  could  create  a  feeling  of 
partnership  between  employer  and  employed  would  be 
the  greatest  of  blessings,  but  nothing  in  that  way  as  yet 
seems  to  have  had  much  success.  The  master  looks 
for  his  gains  to  the  future;  the  mechanic  wants  his 
wages  to-day. 

Saltaire,1  in  which  I  for  a  time  held  an  honorary 
office,  was  not  successful.  It  was  furnished  apparently 
with  everything  that  could  make  its  denizens  happy. 
But  they  kicked  against  every  restriction  and  seemed 
to  feel  that  they  were  not  free.  It  was  the  same  with 
Pullman,  the  model  factory  village  near  Chicago. 
Some  sort  of  partnership  giving  the  men  an  interest 
in  their  work  seems  alone  likely  to  be  the  cure. 

In  1864,  when  the  war  was  drawing  to  a  close,  I 
paid  a  visit  to  the  United  States  charged  with  the 
sympathy  of  Bright,  Cobden,  and  other  British  friends 
of  the  North  as  a  little  antidote  to  the  venom  of  the 
too  powerful  Times.  I  was  desired  at  the  same  time 
to  report  on  the  real  state  of  affairs.  Those  were  the 

[!  A  little  socialistic  town  in  the  West  Riding  of  Yorkshire  three 
miles  from  Bradford,  founded  by  Sir  Titus  Salt  in  1853.] 


328  REMINISCENCES 

days  before  the  cable,  and  we  were  still  imperfectly 
informed,  especially  on  the  vital  question  whether  the 
West  was  acting  heartily  with  the  North  or,  as  the 
friends  of  the  South  averred,  was  a  reluctant  partner  in 
the  struggle.  I  was  also  curious  to  see  the  Civil  War. 

The  first  thing  that  struck  me  was  that  there  was 
no  civil  war  to  be  seen.  The  war  was  between  two 
nations,  formed  by  an  inevitable  disruption,  and  in 
the  Northern,  which  was  the  invading  nation,  though 
war  was  visibly  on  foot,  and  all  minds  and  papers  were 
full  of  it,  life  was  undisturbed.  In  the  Border  States 
alone,  which  were  the  borderland  between  freedom 
and  slavery,  was  there  anything  like  Civil  War.  Social 
intercourse,  therefore,  went  on  as  pleasantly  as  usual, 
and  my  enjoyment  of  it  was  complete. 

My  introductions  were  very  helpful  to  me.  I  saw 
and  heard  all  that  there  was  to  be  seen  or  heard,  and 
met  eminent  men  not  a  few.  I  landed  at  Boston,  after 
what  was  thought  a  good  passage  of  thirteen  days, 
under  the  kind  command  of  Captain  Anderson,  who 
afterwards  laid  the  Atlantic  Cable.  I  was  at  the 
Tremont  Hotel.  The  card  was  sent  up  to  me  of  Mr. 
Loring,1  the  name  of  a  U.  E.  Loyalist  family  connected 
with  my  family  by  marriage.2  The  parlour  of  the  hotel 

[l  Charles  Loring,  a  well-known  member  of  the  Boston  Bar. 
Born  in  Boston,  1794 ;  an  orator  and  an  author.  Died  in  1868.] 

[2  Ann  Smith,  sister  of  Dr.  Richard  Pritehard  Smith  (Goldwin 
Smith's  father),  married  Major  Robert  Loring  on  the  19th  of  July, 
1828.  They  sailed  for  Canada  on  August  the  26th  of  the  same 
year.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  329 

I  found  full  of  people,  among  whom  I  at  once  identified 
Mr.  Loring  by  his  striking  likeness  to  my  connections. 
Going  up  to  him,  I  thanked  him  for  his  call,  which  I 
presumed  had  been  made  at  the  suggestion  of  my 
relatives.  To  my  surprise,  he  had  never  heard  of  them. 
The  family  had  been  divided  by  the  Revolution,  the 
Whig  branch  remaining  at  Boston,  the  Tory  branch 
emigrating  to  Canada.  So  lasting  are  family  features. 
I  afterwards  saw  in  the  house  of  Commissioner  Loring 
at  Washington  what  I  should  at  once  have  taken  for 
the  portrait  of  my  cousin  had  I  not  been  told  that  it 
was  the  beautiful  Mrs.  Loring  who  won  the  heart  of 
General  Howe.  I  was  once  introduced  to  a  Cecil 
whose  likeness  to  my  old  comrade1  on  the  Saturday 
was  so  strong  as  to  make  me  say  that  introduction  was 
almost  needless.  He  replied  that  he  was  not  of  the 
Salisbury  but  of  the  Exeter  branch  of  Cecil,  and  that 
there  had  been  no  intermarriage  between  the  branches 
since  the  time  of  Elizabeth. 

My  friendships  are,  saving  my  marriage,  the  great 
events  of  my  life ;  and  of  my  friendships  none  is  more 
dear  than  that  with  Charles  Eliot  Norton,2  who  was  my 
host,  more  than  hospitable,  at  Cambridge.  He  com- 
bined the  highest  European  culture  with  the  most 
fervent  love  of  his  own  country.  That  his  patriotism 

P  Lord  Robert  Cecil,  afterwards  third  Marquess  of  Salisbury.] 
[2  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  born  at  Cambridge,  Mass.,  in  1827 ; 
editor    (with  J.  R.  Lowell)    of    the  North  American  Review  from 
1864  to  1868 ;  Professor  of  History  at  Harvard  University ;  author 
of  many  works.     Died  October  the  21st,  1908.] 


330  REMINISCENCES 

was  of  the  best  brand  he  has  since  shown  by  doing  his 
best  to  save  his  country  from  the  gulf  of  Imperialist 
folly  and  wickedness  towards  which  evil  men  have  been 
dragging  her.1  Other  Boston  friends,  never  to  be  for- 
gotten, were  Mr.  Charles  Loring  above  mentioned,  and 
Mr.  J.  M.  Forbes,2  both  of  whom  showed  how  in  a  Re- 
public a  man  might  be  a  great  citizen  without  being  a 
professional  politician.  Of  this,  Mr.  Forbes  especially 
was  a  striking  example.  He  was  one  of  the  leaders 
of  Boston  commerce.  He  went  as  an  informal  envoy 
of  the  North  to  England  during  the  war.  He  did  not 
go  into  politics,  which,  as  they  are  managed,  would  have 
been  repellent  to  his  honest  and  generous  nature;  but 
he  did  go  with  all  his  heart  and  soul  into  every  great 
public  cause.  Whenever  public  good  was  to  be  pro- 
moted or  public  evil  to  be  combated,  he  exerted  him- 
self with  an  ardour  which  could  not  have  been  exceeded 
if  a  Prime  Ministership  or  a  Dukedom  had  been  his 
prize.  He  was  a  great  citizen;  a  character  within  the 
reach  of  some  who  could  not  succeed  in  politics  if  they 
would  and  would  not  if  they  could.  Forbes  was  one  of 
the  liveliest  and  most  entertaining  of  hosts  and  com- 
panions. Bright  were  the  days  I  spent  with  him  in 
his  house  with  his  family  circle  at  Milton  Hill  or  at 
his  hunting-box  in  the  island  of  Naushon.  He  had  a 

I1  Referring,  I  suppose,  to  the  American  war  with  Spain,  and  the 
annexation  of  the  Philippines.] 

[2  John  Murray  Forbes,  born  in  1813,  engaged  in  mercantile  pur- 
suits, ship-building,  and  in  railway  and  financial  interests;  died  in 
1898.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  331 

deer  forest  on  the  island  of  Naushon,  where  I  shot  a 
deer.  I  did  not  kill  it ;  it  had  to  be  killed,  and  I  never 
would  shoot  another.  Under  Mr.  Forbes'  roof  I  met 
Emerson.  I  of  course  looked  with  interest  on  a  man 
whose  name  and  influence  were  so  great.  Emerson's 
character  was  undoubtedly  fine  and  his  influence  was 
very  good.  But  I  cannot  honestly  say  that  I  ever  got 
much  from  his  writings.  I  can  find  no  system;  I 
find  only  aphorisms ;  an  avalanche,  as  it  were,  of  uncon- 
nected pebbles  of  thought,  some  of  them  transparent, 
some  translucent,  some  to  me  opaque.  Carlyle  intro- 
duced Emerson  to  the  British  public  as  one  who  brought 
new  fire  from  the  empyrean.  But  the  two  men  in 
genius  were  leagues  apart,  and  Carlyle  at  last  found  the 
new  fire  a  bore.  George  Venables,  calling  one  evening 
on  Carlyle  at  Chelsea,  found  himself  received  with 
extraordinary  warmth,  the  reason  of  which  Mrs.  Car- 
lyle explained  by  exclaiming,  "Oh,  we  were  afraid  it 
was  Emerson."  I  heard  Emerson  lecture.  Now  and 
then  he  shot  a  telling  bolt.  The  rest  of  his  discourse 
to  me  was  almost  darkness.  I  heard  him  read  his 
own  poetry  aloud,  but  it  remained  as  obscure  to  me 
as  before.  Certain,  however,  it  is  that,  by  whatever 
means,  he  was  inspiring  and  an  elevating  influence  in 
his  day ;  which  was  the  critical  tune,  when,  New  Eng- 
land Puritanism  having  lost  its  power,  there  was  press- 
ing need  of  something  to  maintain  spiritual  life.  Long- 
fellow also  I  met,  of  course,  with  interest,  and  he  was 
most  attractive  as  a  man,  though  I  can  hardly  credit 


332  REMINISCENCES 

him  with  anything  more  than  sweetness  as  a  poet. 
Bryant  lives  by  his  "Waterfowl,"  and  almost  by  that 
alone.  Poe  had  poetic  genius  if  he  had  only  taken 
more  care  of  it  and  of  himself.  Excepting  him,  can  it 
be  said  that  America  has  produced  a  poet?  Perhaps 
America  might  ask  whether  at  this  time  there  is  such  a 
thing  as  a  true  poet  in  the  world. 

Lowell,  whom  I  also  met,  was  in  those  days  very 
anti-British.  We  could  not  greatly  complain,  if  the 
feeling  of  the  ruling  class  in  England  was  taken  to  be 
that  of  the  nation,  and  resented  as  such.  The  Times, 
from  its  immense  ascendency  as  a  journal,  was  naturally 
regarded  as  the  great  organ  of  British  opinion,  and 
nothing  could  be  more  galling  to  American  patriotism 
than  its  attacks.  From  their  English  visitor  the  cour- 
tesy of  the  Americans  concealed  any  feeling  they  might 
have  against  his  country.  However,  among  the  best  of 
them  there  was  still  a  lurking  affection  for  the  old  land, 
and  sorrow  rather  than  anger  at  her  defection  from  the 
good  cause.  At  Mr.  Loring's  on  Thanksgiving  Day, 
our  host,  though  one  at  least  of  his  family  was  a  soldier 
on  the  Northern  side,  gave  as  a  toast  "The  President 
of  the  United  States  and  the  Queen  of  England." 

Pleasant  and  instructive  too  were  the  days  which 
I  spent  with  Bancroft,1  the  historian,  in  his  Newport 

I1  George  Bancroft,  the  American  historian,  statesman,  and  diplo- 
matist ;  tutor  of  Greek  at  Harvard  ;  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  1845- 
1846  ;  United  States  Minister  to  England,  1846-1849  ;  Minister  at 
Berlin,  1867-1874.  Wrote  a  "  History  of  the  United  States  "  in  ten 
volumes.  Born  in  1800  ;  died  1891.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  333 

villa.  He  had  been  long  in  public  life,  and  had  known 
Jackson,  whom  he  described,  to  my  surprise,  as  mild 
by  nature  and  putting  himself  into  a  rage  only  when 
it  would  serve  a  purpose.  I  went  with  Bancroft  to  a 
festival  at  Brown  University  in  Providence.  The  ban- 
quet was  in  a  marquee ;  there  was  a  high  wind ;  the 
canvas  flapped;  and  the  speeches  could  not  be  heard. 
I  was  green  enough  not  to  foresee  that  I  should 
be  called  upon  for  a  speech.  Otherwise  the  speech 
would  have  been  written.  Called  upon  I  was,  and 
when  I  had  done  a  reporter  told  me  that  I  had  been 
inaudible,  and  asked  me  for  my  notes.  I  had  no  notes 
to  give  him.  The  boat  was  waiting.  The  reporter 
made  a  speech  for  me  which  I  dare  say  was  better  than 
my  own,  but  certainly  was  not  my  own,  and  took  me 
considerably  aback  when  I  read  it  in  the  paper  next 
morning.  The  demand  for  speeches,  which  I  was  by 
nature  wholly  incapable  of  supplying,  was  the  one 
serious  drawback  of  my  American  tour. 

With  Bancroft  I  renewed  my  acquaintance  at  Wash- 
ington in  his  last  days,  and  made  up  his  whist-table. 
As  a  politician  he  was  said  to  have  rather  overrated 
democracy  and  too  much  idolized  "the  dear  people." 
His  "  History  of  the  United  States"  is  in  somewhat  Fourth 
of  July  style,  as  was  to  be  expected  in  that  day;  but 
it  is  a  considerable  work ;  easy  reading,  and  not  unfair 
or  in  bad  taste  for  its  time. 

Any  doubt  as  to  the  hearty  participation  of  the 
Western  States  in  the  struggle  for  the  Union  was  soon 


334  REMINISCENCES 

set  at  rest.  If  the  North  had  hung  back,  the  West 
would  have  gone  on.  By  the  stalwart  yeomen  of  the 
Western  States  under  Grant  the  tide  was  first  turned 
in  favour  of  the  North  and  victory  was  in  the  end 
mainly  won.  Patriotic  enthusiasm  and  the  spirit  of 
self-sacrifice  were  certainly  intense  and  general.  The 
national  character  at  that  time  rose  to  a  moral  height 
which  has  not  since  been  sustained.  The  Republican 
party,  as  a  body,  remains  the  same,  with  the  name 
unchanged.  But  how  changed  is  the  spirit !  How 
unlike  is  this  league  of  log-rolling  monopolists  to  the 
patriot  democracy  headed  by  Lincoln  in  the  days  of 
the  War ! 

It  was  for  the  Union  rather  than  against  slavery 
that  the  North  in  general  appeared  to  me  to  be  fighting. 
When  the  people  were  asked  the  cause,  the  usual  an- 
swer was  "to  uphold  the  law."  Slavery  was  the  object 
of  hostility  chiefly  because  it  was  the  cause  of  disrup- 
tion. This  was  the  case  especially  with  the  officers  of 
the  army,  among  whom  the  feeling  against  slavery 
was  not  strong.  It  was  partly  a  sense  of  this,  I  believe, 
which  caused  Lincoln  to  hesitate  in  proclaiming  eman- 
cipation. Garrison,1  on  the  other  hand,  and  the  thor- 
ough-going Abolitionists  before  the  war  would  have 
been  glad  to  renounce  the  "covenant  with  hell"  and 
let  the  Slave  States  go.  This,  however,  was  Garrison's 

I1  William  Lloyd  Garrison,  born  in  1805 ;  a  printer  and  journalist ; 
founder  of  the  first  Abolition  Society ;  President  of  the  American 
Anti-Slavery  Society.  Died  in  1879.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  335 

hour  of  victory  after  a  life  of  devotion  and  martyrdom. 
Soon  he  was  to  stand  at  Charleston  triumphant  at  the 
grave  of  Calhoun.  A  sudden  change  is  a  shock,  even 
though  it  be  from  persecution  to  popularity.  When 
a  complimentary  watch  was  presented  to  Garrison,  he 
said  that  he  felt  at  a  loss  for  appropriate  words ;  had  it 
been  a  rotten  egg,  he  would  have  known  exactly  what 
to  say.  Other  men  probably  have  had  the  same  feeling. 
It  seemed  to  me  that  at  the  North  generally  there 
was  a  remarkable  absence  of  truculence.  The  deter- 
mination was  fixed  to  subdue  the  South  and  restore 
the  Union.  But  I  heard  few  expressions  of  thirst  for 
revenge  such  as  were  heard  the  other  day  from  Loyalists 
at  Cape  Town.1  Prisoners  of  war  were  well  treated. 
I  visited  the  prison-camp  at  Chicago  and  saw  that  its 
inmates  were  well  fed  and  were  suffering  no  hardships 
beyond  that  of  confinement.  If  they  died  under  im- 
prisonment, it  was  as  the  caged  eagle  dies.  I  visited 
the  prisoners'  hospital  at  Baltimore,  went  through 
every  part  of  it,  and  satisfied  myself  that  the  treatment 
was  good.  My  visit  was  unannounced.  On  Thanks- 
giving Day  the  table  was  spread  with  the  good  things 
of  the  season.  I  record  this  as  an  answer  to  the  charges 
of  cruelty  rife  at  the  time  in  England.  It  was  the  more 
notable  as  the  treatment  of  Federal  prisoners  in  some 
of  the  Confederate  prisons  was  known  to  be  most 
inhuman.  In  the  Andersonville  prison-camp  it  was 
devilish,  and  such  as  no  want  of  resources  on  the  part 
[i  An  allusion,  of  course,  to  the  Boer  war.] 


336  REMINISCENCES 

of  the  captors  could  excuse.  I  saw  at  Annapolis  the 
first  batch  of  prisoners  exchanged  from  Andersonville. 
They  were  living  skeletons.  I  put  my  finger  and  thumb 
round  the  upper  part  of  a  large  man's  arm.  It  must 
be  said  that  Grant  was  partly  responsible,  if,  as  was 
understood,  he  refused  to  exchange  prisoners.  No 
laws  of  war  surely  can  warrant  the  retention  of  prisoners 
whom  a  captor  cannot  feed.  They  ought  to  be  released 
on  parole. 

Nor  did  it  seem  to  me  that  internal  repression  was 
carried  by  the  Washington  Government  beyond  the 
real  necessities  of  the  case,  considering  that  there  was 
at  the  North  a  party  openly  sympathizing  with  the 
South  and  doing  its  best  to  weaken  the  arm  of  Govern- 
ment in  the  war.  Great  liberty  was  allowed  to  the 
press,  and  the  elections  were  perfectly  free.  I  was  at 
Boston  at  the  time  of  the  second  election  of  Lincoln. 
Party  feeling  of  course  ran  very  high,  yet  the  Demo- 
cratic minority  was  allowed  without  molestation  to 
hold  its  meetings,  hang  out  its  banners  across  the 
street,  and  march  in  its  torchlight  processions.  Nor 
on  that  day  was  there  serious  disturbance,  so  far  as  I 
could  learn,  in  any  one  of  the  Northern  States.  When 
the  Irish  rose  against  the  draft  in  New  York  and  filled 
the  city  with  murderous  outrage,  they  no  doubt  were 
ruthlessly  put  down. 

Even  social  ties  were  less  broken  than  might  have 
been  expected.  At  Boston  I  met  men  of  opposite  par- 
ties under  the  same  roof.  At  Baltimore,  which  was 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  337 

close  upon  the  scene  of  the  war,  and  had  in  it  a  strong 
pro-slavery  party,  by  which  Lee,  if  he  had  conquered 
at  Gettysburg,  would  have  found  the  banquet  spread 
for  him,  the  feeling  was  more  bitter,  and  the  social 
severance  was  complete.  Yet  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Kennedy, 
whose  guest  I  was,  though  ardent  Unionists,  interested 
themselves  actively  in  obtaining  pardon  for  a  lady  who 
had  been  convicted,  not  for  the  first  time,  of  corre- 
spondence with  a  Confederate  raider. 

My  visit  to  the  prison-camp  at  Chicago  was  paid 
under  the  wing  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Bishop,  with 
whom  I  had  some  intercourse.  A  most  highly  culti- 
vated and  very  attractive  man  he  was.  His  gifts  had 
made  him  a  Bishop  at  the  earliest  possible  age.  His 
liberality  surprised  and  almost  startled  me.  Inquiring 
for  him  when  I  afterwards  came  to  America,  I  was 
told  that  mental  illness  had  caused  his  retirement  from 
his  See.  His  brain  had  probably  been  overstrained. 
Had  his  Liberalism  led  him  too  far? 

The  greatest  sign  of  disturbance  was  the  depreciated 
paper  currency.  The  issue  of  this  was  probably  a 
breach  of  the  Constitution,  which  withholds  from  the 
Federal  Government  all  that  it  does  not  give,  and  does 
not  give  the  power  of  issuing  paper  money.  It  would 
have  been  better  and  cheaper  to  borrow  at  the  current 
rate,  whatever  that  rate  might  be.  The  return  to  specie 
in  the  end  probably  cost  a  good  deal  more  than  the  loan 
would  have  cost,  besides  the  disturbance  of  commerce 
and  industry.  I  had  a  talk  on  the  subject  with 


338  REMINISCENCES 

Mr.  Chase,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  on  whom 
I  totally  failed  to  impress  the  orthodox  doctrine.  He 
must  have  understood  the  question  better  than  I  did. 
Perhaps  he  saw  the  truth,  but  held  that  financial  prin- 
ciple must  give  way  to  urgent  necessity.  Fluctuation 
of  wages  could  not  fail  especially  to  be  felt.  I  believe 
there  had  been  no  very  serious  strikes  before  that  time. 
Lincoln  was  comically  ignorant  of  economy.  He  is 
said,  when  there  wras  lack  of  money,  to  have  asked 
whether  the  printing-press  had  given  out.  But  it  is 
surprising  how  many  people  have  a  lurking  idea  that 
the  bank  bill  is  money,  not  clearly  seeing  that  it  is 
a  promissory  note,  and  that  when  it  changes  hands 
specie  passes  at  the  bank  of  issue  from  the  credit  of  the 
giver  to  that  of  the  taker.  The  illusion  is  helped  by 
the  ambiguous  word  "  currency."  One  consequence  is 
that  the  Government,  whose  proper  business  is  only 
to  stamp  the  coin,  fancies  that  it  is  specially  concerned 
in  the  banking  trade,  and  entitled  to  the  profits  of  the 
paper  circulation.  Let  me  say,  however,  that  I  never 
doubted  that  the  paper  promises  of  the  United  States 
would  be  redeemed.  After  my  return  to  England,  I 
found  myself  in  a  large  party  alone  maintaining  that 
the  Americans  would  pay  in  gold.  I  had  a  higher 
opinion  of  their  honesty  than  the  rest  of  the  company ; 
but  I  felt  sure  that  their  commercial  instinct  would 

f1  Salmon  Portland  Chase,  United  States  Senator  from  Ohio, 
1849-1855 ;  Governor  of  Ohio,  1856-1860 ;  Secretary  of  the  Treas- 
ury, 1861-1864 ;  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court,  1864-1873. 
Born  1808 ;  died  1873.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  339 

preserve  them  from  a  ruinous  forfeiture  of  their  credit. 
Had  my  works  been  like  my  faith,  had  I  invested  largely 
in  American  paper  when  it  was  down  to  forty,  my 
visit  would  have  been  profitable  as  well  as  instructive. 
Gettysburg  had  been  fought,  Vicksburg  had  fallen, 
the  murderous  campaign  of  the  Wilderness  had  come 
to  its  close.  Grant  was  before  Petersburg,  and  the 
Confederacy  was  in  its  last  ditch.  I  was  taken  to  the 
scene  of  war  by  General  Benjamin  Butler,1  to  whom  I, 
at  all  events,  owe  gratitude.  We  went  up  the  Potomac 
from  Washington,  starting  coveys  of  ducks  which  had 
enjoyed  a  respite  from  shooting  while  the  sportsmen 
were  shooting  each  other.  Landing,  we  got  on  horse- 
back to  ride  to  Butler's  quarters.  On  the  way  we 
espied  some  men  in  the  bush,  pretty  near  at  hand,  who 
were  pronounced  to  be  Confederate  riflemen.  One 
of  the  party,  a  military  man,  was  inclined  to  retire  and 
re-form.  But  there  was  no  danger.  I  afterwards 
found  that  where  nothing  particular  was  going  on,  I 
could  safely  get  upon  the  parapet  and  look  down  upon 
the  Confederates  changing  guard.  The  humanities 
and  chivalries  of  war  were  well  observed  on  both  sides, 
except  perhaps  by  the  Southerners  towards  negro 
soldiers.  This  proved  to  me  that  there  was  a  sun  behind 
the  cloud,  and  that  the  strife,  bitter  as  it  was  at  the 
time,  would  end  in  reconciliation.  I  was  confirmed  in 
this  forecast  by  hearing  that  a  "sesesh  "  lady  at  Balti- 
more had  eloped  with  a  Yankee  trumpeter. 

f1  See  note  on  page  348,  infra.] 


340  REMINISCENCES 

A  Federal  commander  with  the  local  forces  found 
himself  in  a  very  tight  place.  It  was  a  question  whether 
he  should  waste  blood  by  fighting  or  surrender.  He 
surprised  the  Confederate  by  paying  him  a  visit  under 
a  flag  of  truce  and  asking  him  for  his  candid  opinion 
upon  the  case,  saying  that  he  could  make  a  good  fight, 
but  did  not  wish  to  sacrifice  the  lives  of  his  people  in 
vain.  The  Confederate  showed  him  round  the  position 
and  then  gave  him  his  candid  opinion,  which  was  that 
if  his  command  formed  part  of  a  general  plan  of  opera- 
tions, he  was  bound  to  fight;  otherwise  he  might 
with  propriety  surrender.  I  had  this  story  with  names 
of  persons  and  place,  which  I  have  forgotten.  I  can 
only  say  that  it  was  likely  and  illustrative  of  American 
character  and  of  the  feelings  of  the  military  men  on 
the  two  sides  towards  each  other,  which  never  was  so 
bitter  as  those  of  the  civilians. 

If  the  military  leaders  of  the  South,  after  their  defeat, 
instead  of  being  treated  as  rebels  could  have  been  taken 
into  counsel  in  the  work  of  reconstruction,  the  result, 
though  it  could  hardly  have  solved  the  desperate  negro 
problem,  might  have  been  far  better  than  it  was. 
But,  as  I  have  said,  neither  Lincoln  nor  any  one  else 
seemed  at  that  time  to  understand  that  this  was  not 
a  rebellion,  but  the  inevitable  parting  of  two  groups  of 
States,  radically  antagonistic  in  their  social  and  political 
structure,  which  had  been  long  held  together  in  uneasy 
union  by  hollow  compromise,  but  had  obeyed  -their 
natural  impulses  at  last. 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  341 

When  I  was  in  the  camp  the  two  armies  lay  facing   i 
each  other  in  lines  at  Petersburg.    Richmond  could   1 
almost  be  seen  through  a  telescope,  and  the  last  move 
on  the  chess-board  was  evidently  at  hand,  though  the 
correspondent  of  the  Times  kept  assuring  his  employers   i 
that    Confederate    victory   was   near.    Sherman   was   ' 
setting  out  on  his  famous  march  througn  the  heart  of 
the  Confederacy;   Sheridan  was  ending  the  business  in 
the    Shenandoah   Valley;     and   overwhelming   forces 
were  presently  to  close  upon  Lee.    Against  Grant  alone 
Lee  might  probably  have  maintained  himself.    His 
lines  were  strong;    an  attempt  to  storm  them  after 
mining  failed;   nor  were  his  supplies  either  of  food  or 
ammunition  exhausted.     Prisoners  and  deserters  who 
came  in  were  in  good  case.    They  had  bread  enough, 
though  not  coffee.     Confederate  batteries  were  pretty 
lavish  of  shot   and  shell,   notwithstanding  that  the 
Confederacy  could  not  manufacture  and  that  its  trans- 
portation had  broken  down. 

The  Federal  army  was  evidently  sound  and  abun- 
dantly supplied.  Stories  of  large  foreign  and  Indian 
enlistments  were  fictions.  There  were  Germans  and 
other  immigrants,  no  doubt;  but  they  had  made  the 
United  States  their  country.  There  was  one  Indian, 
not  with  a  tomahawk,  but  with  the  usual  side-arms  of  an 
officer.  In  the  course  of  the  war  there  were,  as  Sir 
John  Macdonald '  told  me,  forty  thousand  Canadian 
enlistments.  But  of  these  men,  again,  many  probably 

[i  Prime  Minister  of  Canada,  1867-1873;   1878-1891.] 


342  REMINISCENCES 

adopted  the  United  States  as  their  country.  Bounties 
were  high,  and  under  the  draft  system  there  were  a  great 
many  substitutes,  giving  occasion  for  not  a  few  jokes. 
A  party  of  returned  soldiers,  it  was  said,  were  recounting 
their  deeds  and  sufferings  in  the  national  cause,  when 
a  voice  broke  in  with  "  Ah !  you  boast  of  your  deeds  and 
sufferings,  but  after  all  you  returned.  I  did  not  return. 
The  bones  of  my  substitute  are  whitening  the  bank  of 
the  James  River." 

The  country  was  thickly  wooded  and  blind.  Grant 
told  me  that  in  action  he  could  not  see  the  length  of  a 
brigade.  A  charge  or  even  a  formation  of  cavalry  would 
have  been  impracticable.  There  could  be  no  sweeping 
up  of  prisoners  at  the  end  of  a  battle.  The  defeated 
army  fell  back  through  the  woods,  and  thus  battles  were 
comparatively  indecisive. 

Grant l  was  a  silent,  somewhat  saturnine  man,  very 
simple  in  his  demeanour  and  habits.  His  quarters  were 
a  common  tent,  in  which  was  a  chest  with  his  kit  marked 
"U.  S.  G.,  U.S.A."  He  was  said  to  dislike  military 
parade  and  even  military  music.  He  seems  to  have 
been  less  of  a  strategist  than  of  a  sledge-hammer  of  war, 
pounding  his  enemy  by  his  blows,  with  little  regard  for 
the  expenditure  of  life.  He  may  be  almost  said  to  have 
professed  the  strategy  of  attrition.  Of  this  the  bloody 
battle  of  Cold  Harbour,  fought  in  a  blind  country,  was 
a  signal  instance.  Why  the  battles  of  the  Wilderness 
were  fought  at  all,  when  the  plan  apparently  was  to  hold 
t1  The  great  Northern  General.  1822-1885.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  343 

Lee  in  the  North  while  Sherman  pierced  the  Confed- 
eracy to  the  heart,  was  a  question  to  which  I  never  could 
get  a  clear  answer  from  a  soldier.  But  there  can  be  no 
doubt  as  to  the  inestimable  service  which  Grant  by  his 
iron  resolution  and  inflexible  tenacity  did  the  cause. 
His  great  victory  at  Fort  Donelson  was  the  first  light  of 
hope  in  a  darkness  which  seemed  almost  that  of  despair. 
He  also  rendered  a  great  service  by  firmly  taking  the 
whole  war  into  his  own  hands  and  out  of  those  of  the 
politicians,  whose  meddling  had  done  much  mischief. 
A  remark  to  the  contrary  in  an  article  of  the  New  York 
Sun  on  "The  Political  Element  in  War-Power"  was 
from  the  pen  of  the  editor,  not  that  of  the  writer.1  His 
generosity  Grant  showed  by  handing  back  to  Sherman, 
when  the  attack  on  Vicksburg  had  succeeded,  the  pro- 
test which  at  the  Council-of-War  Sherman  had  put  in 
against  the  attack.  His  chivalry  was  shown  by  his 
demeanour  to  Lee  after  the  surrender  at  Appomattox, 
when  he  treated  Lee  at  once  as  a  friend  and  refused  to 
receive  his  sword.  His  good  feeling  and  his  good  sense 
together  he  showed  by  at  once  paroling  the  beaten 
army,  providing  for  their  wants,  and  giving  them  back 
their  horses  "for  the  Fall  Ploughing."  He  nobly  de- 
clined to  enter  Richmond  as  a  conqueror. 

Pitchforked  into  the  Presidency  by  the  passion  of 

the  Americans  for  military  glory,  Grant,  being  totally 

without  political  experience,  of  course  failed.    The  only 

political  quality  which  he  had  was  resolution,  which  he 

I1  See  note  on  page  356.] 


344  REMINISCENCES 

once  at  least  opposed,  under  good  advice,  to  his  honest 
and  mischievous  legislation.  He  had  a  fatal  notion  that 
supporting  public  delinquents  of  his  own  party  was 
standing  by  comrades  under  fire.  Between  this  rough 
soldier  and  such  a  man  as  Charles  Sumner,1  with  his 
high-stepping  culture  and  lofty  self-esteem,  antipathy 
was  sure  to  be  strong.  Some  one,  to  please  Grant,  was 
decrying  Sumner  to  him,  saying  that  Sumner  was  a 
Free-thinker  and  did  not  even  believe  in  the  Bible. 
"Well,"  said  Grant,  "I  suppose  he  didn't  write  it." 
Wellington,  between  whom  and  Grant  there  was  some 
resemblance,  also  once  in  his  life  said  a  good  thing. 
When  he  appeared  at  the  Court  of  the  Restoration  the 
Marshals  of  the  Empire  turned  their  backs  on  him. 
The  King  apologized  to  him  for  their  rudeness. 
"N'importe,  Sire,  c'est  leur  habitude,"  was  Welling- 
ton's reply. 

I  met  Grant  and  Mrs.  Grant  some  years  afterwards 
at  a  garden  party  at  Lambeth  Palace.2  A  curiously 
rustic  couple  they  looked  in  that  assemblage  of  fashion. 
Grant  was  then  touring  under  the  auspices  of  politicians 
who  wanted  a  third  term  for  him  and  thought  it  might 
be  secured  by  presenting  him  to  the  world's  homage. 
No  showman  could  have  had  a  worse  lion.  Stanley, 
who  showed  Grant  over  Westminster  Abbey,  said  that 
of  all  men  of  rank  whom  he  had  met  Grant  "was  the 

P  Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Affairs,  1861-1871. 
He  was  removed  from  it  for  his  opposition  to  Grant's  policy  regard- 
ing the  Annexation  of  San  Domingo.] 

[2  The  residence  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  345 

most  boorish."  Grant  was  no  doubt  unappreciative 
of  antiquities,  and  Stanley  had  no  opportunity  of  diving 
into  the  character  of  the  man. 

Sherman,  who  was  accounted  the  greatest  strategist 
on  the  side  of  the  North,  though  some  put  Thomas  1 
first,  I  met  some  years  afterwards  at  a  dinner  of  the 
Chamber  of  Commerce  at  New  York.  He  was  then, 
I  thought,  showing  the  effect  of  years.  I  may  mention 
in  passing  that  I  did  not,  as  the  Quarterly  Review  stated, 
at  that  time  or  on  any  other  public  occasion  in  the 
United  States,  talk  annexation,  and  that  Sherman, 
whom  the  Quarterly  gleefully  represented  as  having 
rebuked  me,  spoke  before  me,  so  that  nothing  he  said 
could  have  reference  to  my  speech.  Nor,  in  a  conversa- 
tion which  I  had  with  him  afterwards,  did  he  take  the 
slightest  exception  to  anything  I  had  said.  The  subject 
was  Reciprocity,  to  which  my  remarks  were  confined.2 

t1  General  George  Henry  Thomas,  the  defender  of  Chickamauga. 
1816-1870.] 

[*  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  speech  was  delivered  at  the  banquet  of 
the  Chamber  of  Commerce  of  the  State  of  New  York,  on  the  20th 
of  November,  1888,  in  response  to  the  toast  "Our  Relations  with 
Canada  —  May  all  our  differences  be  amicably  adjusted,  and  our 
intercourse  become  increasingly  reciprocal  and  profitable."  In 
the  course  of  this  speech  occur  the  following  remarks:  "There 
are  some  of  us,  however,  who  look  forward  to  a  more  complete  and 
lasting  settlement  of  all  commercial  questions  between  Canada 
and  the  United  States  than  any  Fisheries  Treaty  can  afford.  .  .  . 
The  Fisheries  dispute  will  be  at  rest  forever,  when  the  fisheries  and 
the  coasting  trade  are  common  to  us  all  ...  there  are  .  .  .  who  be- 
lieve that  the  English-speaking  race  upon  this  continent  will  some  day 
be  one  people."  It  was  afterwards  printed  in  pamphlet  form,  with 
the  imprint:  "New- York:  Press  of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce. 
1888." 


346  REMINISCENCES 

I  also  some  years  afterwards  at  Philadelphia  made 

The  animadversions  of  the  Quarterly  Review  (Vol.   170,  No.  340, 
Art.  X,  pp.  537  and  538)  are  as  follows :  — 

"There  are  two  distinguished  British  subjects  residing  in  Canada, 
who,  from  the  prominence  given  in  the  English  press  to  then*  ut- 
terances, have  a  certain  notoriety  on  this  side  the  Atlantic  as  favour- 
ing the  annexation  of  Canada  to  the  United  States.  Mr.  Goldwin 
Smith,  and  Mr.  Honore  Mercier,  the  French  Catholic  Premier  of 
Quebec,  not  unfrequently  deliver  sentiments  which,  in  the  days 
when  the  term  was  in  usage,  might  have  qualified  them  for  the  title 
of  rebels ;  but  we  are  perfectly  certain  that  either  of  those  eminent 
personages  would  much  prefer  to  be  called  a  rebel  than  to  be  coupled 
and  associated  in  the  minds  of  men  with  the  other.  Of  Mr.  Goldwin 
Smith  we  would  at  once  say  that  his  motives  are  as  disinterested 
as  they  are  mischievous ;  but  though  mischievous  his  motives,  the 
mischief  he  effects  is  infinitesimal,  —  that  is  to  say,  it  amounts  to 
the  harm  which  ensues  from  the  printing  in  large  type  of  his  letters, 
advocating  the  disruption  of  the  Empire,  in  London  journals  which 
profess  Imperialism.  Though  we  reprobate  his  views,  we  think  that 
the  old  Regius  Professor  is  often  unjustly  treated.  People  who 
do  not  know  him  derive  their  impression  of  the  man  From  Mr. 
Disraeli's  rancorous  portrait  of  him  in  'Lothair';  he  is  there  de- 
scribed as  talking  a  language  of  'ornate  jargon' ;  as  a  matter  of  fact 
his  diction  is  severe  compared  to  Mr.  Disraeli's,  and  we  regret  that 
his  plausible  sentiments  are  not  veiled  in  jargon,  but  are  on  the 
contrary  expressed  in  admirable  and  forcible  English.  He  has  lately 
had  his  revenge  on  his  limner  in  a  recent  oration  at  New  York, 
when  he  emphasized  his  offer  of  Canada  to  the  American  nation 
by  an  unearthed  quotation  from  an  ancient  letter  of  Lord  Beacons- 
field,  who  once  seems  to  have  written  mysteriously  that  'the  Colo- 
nies, and  Canada  in  particular,  were  millstones  round  our  necks, 
but  that  they  would  soon  be  independent.'  It  is,  moreover,  unjust 
to  ascribe  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  disaffection  to  any  disappointments 
he  may  have  encountered  in  his  Canadian  career,  as  we  find  Sir 
George  Bowen  describing  in  1862  his  schemes  for  the  emancipation 
of  Australia.  It  ought,  however,  to  be  put  on  record,  for  the  benefit 
of  those  who  are  perturbed  by  his  letters  to  the  English  papers, 
that  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  has  no  following  whatever  in  Canada,  and 
no  disciples  across  the  frontier  of  his  unpatriotic  propaganda. 
Around  his  home  in  Toronto  he  has  hosts  of  personal  friends  and 
not  one  political  ally.  In  the  United  States  an  ungrateful  lack  of 
warmth  greets  his  harangues,  in  which  he  inveighs  against  the  un- 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  347 

the  acquaintance  of  Meade,1  who  appeared  to  me  a  high- 
minded  soldier  and  a  thorough  gentleman.  I  could  well 
believe  that  he  had  done  good  service  in  restoring  the 
tone  of  the  Army  of  the  Potomac  when  it  had  been  run 
down  under  Hooker.2  Of  Meade's  generalship  I  am  of 
course  incompetent  to  form  a  judgment.  It  may  be 
that  after  the  repulse  of  Lee's  attack  at  Gettysburg, 
he  ought  to  have  ordered  his  line  to  advance.  Had  he 
attacked  Lee  in  the  position  which  Lee  afterwards  took 
up,  he  might  have  lost  what  he  had  won  at  Gettysburg, 
so  great  had  become  the  superiority  of  the  defence  over 
the  attack.  He  was  very  candid  in  saying  that  at 
Gettysburg  Lee  had  thrown  away  his  chances,  and  that 
had  he  manoeuvred  instead  of  rushing  against  a  strong 
position,  the  result  would  not  have  been  so  sure.  He 
said  not  a  word  against  Grant,  but  showed,  I  thought, 
that  he  did  not  admire  the  strategy  of  attrition. 
Lee3  has  been  pronounced  a  great  strategist  by  those 


natural  division  of  a  continent  which  Providence  destined  to  be  one. 
Not  long  ago  he  was  about  to  discourse  in  this  wise  to  an  American 
audience  at  a  banquet,  when  the  veteran  General  Sherman,  perhaps 
anticipating,  arose  and  said :  '  The  American  people  want  not  an- 
other rood  of  bad  land  in  Mexico  or  of  good  land  in  Canada.'  After 
that,  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  customary  periods  about  'one  flag,  one 
language,  one  literature,'  lacked  a  little  of  their  usual  sonority."] 

[*  General  George  Gordon  Meade,  Commander  of  the  Army  of 
the  Potomac  from  June,  1863,  till  the  close  of  the  war.  1815- 
1872.] 

[2  General  Joseph  Hooker  was  appointed  to  the  command  of  the 
Army  of  the  Potomac  in  January,  1863  ;  he  was  relieved  of  his  com- 
mand in  the  following  June.] 

[3  Robert  Edward  Lee,  the  great  Confederate  General.  1807- 
1870.1 


348  REMINISCENCES 

whose  judgment  cannot  be  disputed,  though  only  by 
an  American  writer  has  he  been  put  above  Marlborough. 
He  can  scarcely  be  said  to  have  encountered  an  op- 
ponent worthy  of  him  before  Gettysburg.  His  two 
offensive  movements  were  unsuccessful ;  the  first  end- 
ing with  Antietam,  the  second  with  Gettysburg.  But 
he  was  constrained  to  make  them  by  the  nature  of  the 
war,  which  was  a  monster  siege  of  the  South  by  the 
North.  Lee  sallied  in  hopes  of  shaking  off  the  besieger, 
gathering  supplies,  and  at  the  same  time  calling  forth 
political  sympathy  and  support  at  the  North.  It  seems 
to  be  admitted  that  he  did  a  desperate  thing  at  Gettys- 
burg in  ordering  the  advance  of  his  infantry  over  more 
ttian  half  a  mile  of  open  ground  against  a  formidable 
position  with  a  powerful  artillery.  He  had  done  some- 
thing of  the  same  kind  at  Malvern  Heights,  with  the 
same  disastrous  result.  General  Lee  seems  to  have 
fought,  not  against  the  Union,  nor  for  slavery;  but 
simply  as  a  liegeman  of  his  State.  His  character  evi- 
dently was  fine,  and  well  would  it  have  been  both  for 
South  and  North  if  in  Reconstruction  his  voice  could 
have  been  heard. 

The  name  of  General  Benjamin  Butler,1  whose  guest  I 
was  at  the  Camp,  had  been  execrated  because  he  was 
supposed,  as  Commandant  of  New  Orleans,  to  have  put 
forth  a  proclamation  threatening  to  give  up  the  women 
of  that  city  to  the  license  of  his  soldiery.  The  charge 

P  Benjamin  Franklin  Butler,  commanded  the  Army  of  the  James ; 
military  governor  of  New  Orleans.  1818-1893.] 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  349 

was  unfounded.    Butler  was  commanding  the  Federal 
garrison  of  a  great  city  with  a  population  noted  for 
violence,   turbulence,   and   fanatical   devotion  to  the 
cause  of  slavery.    The  women,  whose  passions,  as  usual, 
were  the  fiercest,  insulted  his  men  on  the  streets,  and 
there  was  constant  danger  of  an  affray  which  would 
have  led  to  bloodshed.    To  avert  this,  Butler  threatened  * 
the  women,  if  their  insults  were  repeated,  with  being  • 
sent  to  the  lock-up  house  like  common  women  of  the  1 
town.     His  proclamation  was  coarse,  as  anything  of  ^ 
his  was  likely  to  be ;  but  it  did  not  bear,  nor  would  any 
unprejudiced  reader  have  taken  it  to  bear,  the  odious 
sense  ascribed  to  it.     Butler  was  a  curious  personage. 
He  was  exceedingly  ugly,  and  squinted  horribly;    but 
his  face  and  figure  were  an  incarnation  of  rude  force, 
and  reminded  you  of  a  steam  ram.    Unscrupulous  he 
was  in  the  highest  degree.    But  I  believe  his  ruling 
passion  was  notoriety  rather  than  gain.    Those  who 
were  put  on  his  track  at  New  Orleans  found,  as  I  was 
told  at  the  time,  no  trace  of  his  stealing  for  himself, 
though  he  had  winked  at  the  doings  of  subordinates. 
He  was  evidently  a  loving  husband  to  his  amiable  wife 
and  a  loving  father  to  his  beautiful  daughter.    He  was 
evidently  popular  with  his  aides  and  with  his  men.    He   I 
wanted  to  be  President.    This  was  his  motive  in  his  t 
attack  on  Andrew  Johnson  *  and  in  his  advocacy  of 
repudiation.     In  his  advocacy  of  repudiation  he  was 

P  Andrew  Johnson,  seventeenth  President  of  the  United  States. 
1808-1875.] 


350  REMINISCENCES 

misled,  as  the  unscrupulous  are  apt  to  be,  by  under- 
rating the  general  honesty  of  the  world. 

Butler  was  a  very  sociable  and  amusing  companion. 
He  had  stories  to  tell  of  himself.  When  he  was  com- 
manding at  New  Orleans,  to  prevent  an  outbreak,  he 
had  issued  a  general  order  requiring  all  citizens  in  pos- 
session of  arms  to  deliver  them  up  at  headquarters. 
A  citizen  was  found  possessing  arms  in  contravention 
of  the  order,  and  with  his  arms  was  brought  before  the 
General.  He  pleaded  that  the  arms  were  only  family 
relics.  "That,  General,  was  my  father's  sword." 
"When  did  your  father  die,  Sir?"  "In  1858."  "Then 
he  must  have  worn  the  sword  in  hell,  Sir,  for  it  was 
made  in  1859." 

Ben  had  been  a  first-rate  criminal  counsel  —  Old 
Bailey  counsel,  as  the  English  would  say,  and  he  brought 
his  sharp  practice  to  bear  upon  the  question  as  to  the 
principle  on  which  the  negro  should  be  treated  by  the 
Northern  armies;  emancipation  having  not  yet  been 
proclaimed.  Ben  astutely  advised  that  the  negro,  as 
his  labour  sustained  the  enemy,  should  be  treated  as 
contraband  of  war. 

As  a  General,  Ben  was  not  a  success.  Grant  said  that 
he  was  "bottled  up"  in  the  bend  of  the  James  River 
where  he  was  carrying  on  some  engineering  operations 
suggested  by  his  restlessly  inventive  genius.  He  did 
me  the  honour  to  impart  to  me  his  plan  for  blowing  up 
Fort  Fisher,  which  had  obstinately  resisted  Federal 
attack,  by  running  ashore  under  it  a  gunboat  loaded 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  351 

with  powder.  I  could  not  help  venturing  to  suggest 
the  general  ineffectiveness  of  powder  fired  in  the  open 
air.  But  Butler  thought  he  had  scientific  proof  that 
the  displacement  of  air  would  be  so  great  that  Fort 
Fisher  would  cease  to  exist.  The  experiment  was 
afterwards  made,  and  the  breaking  of  two  or  three 
windows  in  the  Fort  was  the  only  result. 

I  had  first  fallen  in  with  Butler  at  New  York,  whither 
he  had  been  summoned  at  the  time  of  Lincoln's  second 
election  with  troops  to  prevent  a  second  rising  of  Irish 
against  the  draft.  He  did  not  land  his  troops,  but 
came  ashore  himself  with  his  staff,  called  the  leaders  of 
the  Irish  before  him,  told  them  that  he  was  glad  to 
have  the  pleasure  of  meeting  them,  and  that  if  any  dis- 
turbance  took  place  he  would  hold  them  personally 
responsible.  No  disturbance  took  place.  The  grateful 
city  planted  Butler  for  an  evening  in  a  hall  of  the  Fifth 
Avenue  Hotel  while  an  endless  train  of  citizens  filed 
past  him,  each  of  them  taking  him  by  the  hand.  His 
hand  must  have  been  surfeited  with  public  gratitude. 

The  soldiers  of  the  North  were  not  only  well  but 
lavishly  supplied.  On  that  side  the  war  exceeded  all 
wars  in  its  cost.  It  is  perhaps  fortunate  for  democracy 
that,  as  it  is  bound  to  treat  every  man  well,  it  must  find 
the  luxury  of  war  expensive.  Confederate  prisoners 
seemed  in  pretty  good  case,  and  said  that,  though  they 
had  nothing  but  bread,  of  bread  they  had  enough. 
How  they  managed  to  supply  themselves  with  ammuni- 
tion, of  which  they  were  lavish,  in  their  exhausted  state 


352  REMINISCENCES 

and  with  their  railroads  all  dilapidated,  was  a  mys- 
tery. 

I  saw  but  little  fighting ;  only  just  enough  to  impress 
me  with  the  belief  that  cannon-balls  and  shells  in  the 
open  field  were  rather  ineffective,  and  that  the  rifle  aimed 
at  you  was  the  really  formidable  weapon.  The  range  of 
artillery,  however,  has  greatly  increased  since  that  time. 

I  saw  the  wounded  in  a  field  hospital ;  and  I  venture 
to  say  that  nobody  who  had  done  the  same  would  ever 
speak  lightly  of  war  or  gloat  over  the  reports  of  carnage. 
The  hospital  arrangements  seemed  to  me  to  be  excellent. 
The  plan  adopted  was  that  of  isolated  pavilions  to  obvi- 
ate infection.  I  thought  of  that  field  hospital  when  our 
gentlemen  and  ladies  at  Toronto  were  exulting  over  the 
slaughter  of  Boers  in  the  South  African  War. 

From  the  camp  on  the  Potomac  I  went  back  to  Wash- 
ington, which  in  1864  was  a  different  place  from  the 

••••••I^Q 

bright  and  beautiful  city  now  becoming  the  social  capi- 
tal of  America.  The  northwestern  quarter  with  its 
gay  mansions  had  not  been  built.  There  was  scarcely 
a  house  of  any  pretensions  except  the  White  House. 
Pennsylvania  Avenue  looked  like  a  string  of  shabby 
villages.  The  sidewalks  were  unrepaired;  the  roads 
were  mud-holes.  Frequent  on  the  houses  were  the 
advertisements  of  embalmment  of  the  dead,  thirteen 
thousand  of  whom  lay  in  a  provisional  cemetery  near 
the  city  awaiting,  most  of  them,  removal  to  their  own 
States.  For  my  own  part,  I  cannot  understand  such 
care  for  the  cast-off  weeds  of  humanity.  Immediate 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  353 

return  into  the  general  frame  of  Nature  seems  to  me 
the  only  agreeable  idea  connected  with  death.  But 
the  care  taken  for  the  relics  of  these  soldiers  showed 
that  the  army  was  not  one  of  hirelings ;  few  of  the 
head-boards  bore  the  inscription  "  Unknown  Soldier." 

At  Washington  I  had  the  honour  of  being  the  guest 
of  Mr.  Seward  l  and  saw  the  diplomatist  unbend  in  his 
social  hour.  He  did  indeed  unbend  in  his  social  hour, 
and  there  was  no  limit  to  the  freedom  of  his  talk.  In 
those  days  happily  social  confidence  was  still  sacred, 
and  Seward  might  unbosom  himself  with  the  certainty 
that  of  his  guests  there  was  not  one  who  would  not 
deem  himself  degraded  by  repeating  anything  that  was 
said  at  the  social  board.  Seward  was  at  the  same  time 
the  least  cautious  of  diplomatists,  and  some  tunes  star- 
tled the  British  Ambassador,  Lord  Lyons,2  who  was 
accustomed  to  the  reticence  and  impassiveness  of  diplo- 
matists in  the  Old  World.  He  now  and  then  risked  a 
joke,  which  was  liable  to  be  misunderstood.  One  of 
these  jokes,  something  about  bombarding  Liverpool, 
had  been  made  to  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  who  was 
rather  dry  and  touchy,  and,  being  recalled  at  a  time 
when  there  was  gunpowder  lying  about,  came  near  to 
producing  an  explosion. 

Crossing  the  mud-hole  between  Seward's  house  and 

[l  William  Henry  Seward,  Governor  of  New  York ;  United  States 
Senator ;  Secretary  of  State,  1861-1869.  Born  in  1801 ;  died  in 
1872.] 

[2  Richard  Bickerton  Pemell,  second  Baron  and  first  Earl  Lyons, 
British  Minister  at  Washington.  1858-1865.] 

2A 


354 


REMINISCENCES 


an  official  building,  I  presented  my  card  and  found  my- 
self in  the  presence  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  The  notion 
formed  of  Lincoln  in  England  had  been  that  of  a  Yankee 
rail-splitter  with  an  ungainly  and  grotesque  figure,  dis- 
playing an  unfeeling  levity  by  the  utterance  of  rather 
coarse  jokes,  from  which  he  did  not  abstain  even  among 
the  relics  of  the  battle-field.  Ungainly  and  grotesque 
the  figure,  with  its  gaunt  height,  its  shock  of  unkempt 
hair,  and  its  large  hands  and  feet,  undeniably  was; 
but  on  the  face,  instead  of  levity,  sat  melancholy  and 
care.  The  little  stories,  in  which  Lincoln  often  wrapt 
up  his  reasonings  and  of  which  he  told  me  one  or  two 
during  our  interview,  were  the  indulgence  of  a  Western 
habit  and  perhaps  a  relief  of  the  overstrained  mind ;  as 
it  were,  pinches  of  mental  snuff.  Lincoln  since  his 
death  has  been  deified.  He  has  been  styled  the  greatest 
statesman  of  the  age.  The  American  mind  is  never 
sparing  of  superlatives  in  either  extreme.  He  had  the 
wisdom  which  happily  belongs  to  a  perfectly  honest 
and  simple  character.  He  never  was  misled  by 
cupidity,  vanity,  or  selfishness  of  any  kind.  He  had 
also,  as  the  result  of  a  naturally  sympathetic  nature, 
improved  by  campaign  practice,  a  remarkable  power  of 
reading  public  sentiment  and  keeping  himself  in  touch 
with  what  he  called  the  plain  people.  His  addresses 
and  State  papers  are  admirable;  the  simplicity  and 
clearness  of  their  style  bespoke  the  integrity  and  sin- 
cerity of  their  author.  But,  as  I  have  said,  Lincoln,  if 
he  saw,  never  showed  that  he  saw  the  fundamental 


AMERICAN  CIVIL  WAR  355 

character  of  the  situation  with  which  he  had  to  deal. 
He  always  spoke  and  wrote  as  if  he  took  Secession  to  be 
a  rebellion,  whereas  it  was  a  natural  severance  of  the 
slave-owning  South  from  the  free  North,  social  struc- 
ture having,  as  usual,  asserted  its  ascendency  over 
political  organization.  How  he  would  have  dealt  with 
Reconstruction  is  a  secret  Buried  in  his  grave ;  more 
wisely,  it  may  safely  be  assumed,  tHan  did  Charles 
Sumner  and  the  other  fiery  and  revengeful  politicians 
into  whose  hands,  after  his  death,  the  question  passed. 
His  character,  whatever  his  theory,  would  have  guided 
him  and  the  State  aright.  In  resolving  to  despatch 
supplies  to  Fort  Sumter  Lincoln  may  perhaps  be  said 
to  have  brought  on  war;  and  supreme  statesmanship 
would  hardly  do  that  which  in  itself  is  little  worth  do- 
ing if  tremendous  consequences  are  to  follow.  But  if 
Lincoln  had  any  share  in  the  failure  to  avert  war,  his 
responsibility  is  fully  balanced  by  that  of  the  Southern 
chiefs.  Had  Jeff  Davis  and  his  colleagues,  scrupulously 
abstaining  from  anything  like  violence  or  insult,  put 
forth  a  temperate  and  respectful  manifesto,  setting  forth 
the  proved  impracticability  of  a  political  union  between 
communities  radically  different  in  social  structure,  and 
appealing  to  the  people  of  the  North  for  acquiescence  in 
a  friendly  separation,  with  full  security  for  debts  and  as 
much  of  reciprocal  privilege  as  national  independence 
would  permit,  the  Northern  people  would  scarcely  have 
called  on  the  Government  to  go  to  war. 
No  one  could  have  failed  to  be  struck  by  Lincoln's 


356  REMINISCENCES 

unguarded  state,  there  being  even  then  threats  of 
assassination  in  the  air.  A  desperado  might  easily  have 
rushed  past  the  sentinel  who  paced  outside  the  door. 
When,  therefore,  a  report  of  the  assassination  reached 
us  in  England,  I  felt  at  once  that  it  would  prove  true. 
Let  me  with  others  bear  witness  that,  in  spite  of  the 
anti- American  feeling  which  prevailed  in  certain  classes, 
the  news  was  received  in  England  with  general  sorrow. 


Note  by  the  Editor. 

The  article  on  "  The  Political  Element  in  War-Power  "  in 
the  New  York  Sun,  referred  to  on  page  343,  appeared  on 
Sunday,  March  the  15th,  1896.  It  was  written  by  Mr.  Gold- 
win  Smith.  In  it  occurs  the  following  sentence:  — 

"  Party  politics  are  said  to  have  interfered  in  some  degree  -with 
military  appointments  and  operations  ;  and  it  has  even  been  said, 
though  without  the  least  grain  of  truth,  that  at  one  time  Gen.  Grant 
manifested  a  resolute  determination  to  cut  loose  from  Washington 
and  keep  the  conduct  of  the  war  in  his  own  hands." 

In  the  copy  preserved  at  The  Grange,  a  pen  has  been  drawn 
through  the  words  I  have  Italicized,  and  against  them  has 
been  written,  "  Interpolated  by  Dana  probably." 


CHAPTER  XX 

JAMAICA 
1866 

Conflict  of  Races  —  Outbreak  —  Governor  Eyre's  Action — The 
Jamaica  Committee  —  Chief  Justice  Cockburn's  Charge  — 
John  Stuart  Mill  —  Woman  Suffrage  —  Thomas  Hughes  — 
Frederick  Denison  Maurice  —  Manchester  Liberals. 

A  SORT  of  corollary  of  the  question  between  slavery 
and  freedom  in  America  was  that  caused  by  the  conflict 
of  races  in  Jamaica.  The  ex-slaveholder's  hatred  and 
fear  of  the  emancipated  slave,  after  long  brooding,  broke 
out  in  1865  with  terrible  violence.  A  local  and  acci- 
dental affray  caused  by  the  unpopularity  of  a  district 
magistrate  was  seized  upon  by  the  whites  as  a  pre- 
text for  a  reign  of  terror,  Governor  Eyre1  sharing 
and  giving  the  reins  to  their  panic  rage.  Altogether 
four  hundred  and  thirty-nine  men  and  women  were  put 
to  death,  and  the  number  flogged  could  not  have  been 
less  than  six  hundred.  The  hangings  went  on  for 
nearly  five  weeks  after  the  outbreak.  Men  received 
one  hundred  lashes;  women  thirty.  Many  of  those 
who  were  flogged  with  a  cat-o'-nine-tails  were  women 
on  the  simple  charge  of  stealing.  Wire  was  twisted 
round  the  cords  of  the  whip.  There  had  been  enmity, 

[l  Edward  John  Eyre,  previously  Lieutenant-Governor  of  An- 
tigua.] 

357 


358  REMINISCENCES 

personal  as  well  as  political,  between  Governor  Eyre 
and  William  Gordon,  the  political  leader  of  the  blacks. 
Eyre  arrested  Gordon  at  Kingston,  where  martial  law 
did  not  prevail ;  carried  him  into  a  district  where  mar- 
tial law  had  been  proclaimed  and  a  court-martial  wras 
sitting;  packed  the  court  afresh;  and  when  even  that 
packed  court  hesitated  to  put  the  man  to  death  without 
evidence,  himself  ordered  the  execution.  "Murder," 
said  John  Bright,  "is  foul;  and  judicial  murder  is  the 
foulest  of  ail." 

A  Committee  was  formed  in  the  interest  of  humanity 
and  justice.  We  were  not  bloody-minded ;  we  did  not 
want  to  hang  Governor  Eyre  or  care  to  punish  him, 
otherwise  than  by  dismissal  from  his  Governorship, 
from  which  in  fact  he  was  removed.  But  we  did  wish, 
by  bringing  him  to  the  bar  of  justice,  to  prove  that  all 
British  subjects,  black  or  white,  were  under  the  protec- 
tion of  British  law.  We  did  want  to  vindicate  human- 
ity. In  this  we  were  defeated  by  the  sympathy  of  the 
Tory  upper  classes  with  arbitrary  and  sanguinary 
violence.  A  member  of  the  House  of  Lords  told  Gov- 
ernor Eyre  publicly  that  if  his  case  came  before  them 
he  would  find  them  a  friendly  tribunal.  The  Anglican 
clergy  played  their  usual  part,  confirming  and  strength- 
ening my  opinion  of  them.  Such  was  the  natural 
consequence  of  Establishment.  Carlyle,  Kingsley,  and 
Ruskin  were  of  course  for  violence,  which  they  took  for 
strength.  The  calls  of  sentimental  eunuchs  like  Ruskin 
for  blood  on  this  occasion,  and  at  the  time  of  the  Indian 


JAMAICA  359 

Mutiny,  made  an  indelible  impression  on  my  mind.  The 
best  fruit  of  our  movement  was  a  memorable  Charge 
of  Chief-Justice  Cockburn  against  the  abuse  of  martial 
law.1  The  Chief- Justice  weakened  in  his  practical 
conclusion,  but  to  his  declaration  of  principles  justice 
and  mercy  could  always  appeal. 

On  the  Jamaica  Committee  I  met  John  Stuart  Mill,2 
the  most  strictly  conscientious  man,  I  think,  that  I  ever 
knew.  In  an  unhappy  moment  he  allowed  himself  to  be 
elected  to  the  House  of  Commons,  and  sat  night  after 
night,  like  an  image  of  patience,  listening  to  debates  on 
which  the  time  of  the  great  philosopher  and  economist 
was  miserably  wasted.  His  conscientiousness  was  car- 
ried into  his  habits  as  a  speaker.  His  speeches  were 
prepared,  and  he  sometimes  lost  the  thread.  But  he 
would  not,  like  less  scrupulous  speakers,  fill  the  gap  with 
mere  words;  he  would  wait,  however  awkward  the 
pause  might  be,  till  the  thread  was  recovered.  I  have 
always  looked  upon  him  as  a  notable  instance  of  the 
division  which  is  taking  place  between  the  dogmas  and 
the  ethics  of  Christianity ;  the  dogmas  remaining  with 
the  orthodox,  the  ethics  often  going  to  the  infidel. 

P  This  Charge  was  afterwards  printed  in  pamphlet  form.  See 
"Charge  of  the  Lord  Chief  Justice  of  England  to  the  Grand  Jury 
at  the  Central  Criminal  Court  in  the  case  of  The  Queen  against 
Nelson  and  Brand.  Taken  from  the  Shorthand  Writer's  Notes, 
Revised  and  Corrected  by  the  Lord  Chief  Justice.  With  Occa- 
sional Notes."  Edited  by  Frederick  Cockburn,  Esq.,  of  the  Crown 
Office.  London:  William  Ridgway.  1867.] 

»P  Author  of  "A  System  of  Logic";  "Principles  of  Political 
Economy"  ;  "Representative  Government" ;  "Utilitarianism" ;  etc. 
1806-1873.] 


360  REMINISCENCES 

Upon  the  ethics  it  is  to  be  hoped  Christendom  will  re- 
unite. 

It  was  partly,  I  think,  from  respect  to  Mill  that  Bright 
and  I  signed  his  first  petition  in  favour  of  Woman 
Suffrage.  Afterwards  we  both  withdrew;  and  I  be- 
lieve on  the  same  ground,  because  we  found  that  the 
best  representatives  of  the  sex  among  our  acquaintance 
were  opposed  to  the  measure.  Mill's  enthusiasm  on  this 
subject,  I  have  always  suspected,  had  its  source  in  his 
personal  history.  He  had  received  from  his  father  an 
arid  and  heart-withering  education  which  developed 
his  intellect  intensely,  at  the  expense  of  his  affections. 
Later  in  life  the  affections  asserted  a  power  increased 
by  their  long  suppression.  He  fell  platonically  in  love 
with  the  wife  of  his  friend  Mr.  Taylor,  and  consorted 
with  her  in  a  way  which  he  sincerely  supposed  her 
husband  to  approve.  His  fancy  invested  her  with  ex- 
traordinary genius.  But  those  who  knew  her  told  me 
that  her  genius  consisted  in  the  faculty  of  readily  imbib- 
ing Mill's  theories  and  giving  them  back  to  him  as  her 
own.  In  the  parts  of  his  works  which  he  ascribes  spe- 
cially to  her  inspiration,  no  extraordinary  power  is  shown. 
Had  his  book  on  the  Subjection  of  Women1  taken  full 
effect,  its  exaggerations  might  have  disturbed  the  peace 
and  happiness  of  many  homes.  He  did  not  know,  or 
at  least  did  not  lay  it  to  heart,  that  of  the  two  unions 
that  of  the  State  and  that  of  the  family,  that  of  the 
family  is  as  essential  and  as  sacred  as  that  of  the  State. 

[l  Published  in  1869.] 


JAMAICA 

Another  leading  member  of  the  Jamaica  Committee 
was  Thomas  Hughes.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  he  was 
Tom  Brown  grown  up.  Well  did  he  deserve  his  statue 
at  Rugby.  In  him  all  the  manly,  the  robust,  and  even 
the  fighting  qualities  of  which  Englishmen  are  proud 
were  combined  with  perfect  gentleness,  tenderness,  and 
humanity,  as  well  as  with  the  broadest  liberality  of 
mind.  With  all  his  vigour  and  courage,  there  was  not 
the  faintest  odour  of  Jingoism  about  him.  We  became 
great  friends,  and  I  was  his  guest  at  Chester,  when  we 
were  fighting  together  for  the  Union  against  Gladstone 
and  Home  Rule. 

Hughes  had  been  one  of  the  Christian  Socialists,  who, 
sympathizing  with  the  Socialist  desire  of  substituting 
co-operation  for  competition,  tried  to  give  it  effect  on 
Christian  principles,  while  the  ordinary  Socialists  were 
agnostics.  Their  attempts  to  set  on  foot  co-operative 
production  were  failures,  labour  not  proving  able  to 
dispense  with  the  guidance  or  the  support  of  capital. 
Whether  they  had  much  to  do  with  the  brilliant  suc- 
cess of  co-operative  distribution  I  cannot  say.  But 
they  certainly  did  something  towards  the  mitigation  of 
class  bitterness.  Hughes  towards  the  end  of  his  life  was 
led  by  his  philanthropic  zeal  to  become  the  founder  of  a 
model  colony  in  Tennessee.  It  appears  that  he  was 
deceived  in  the  purchase  of  the  land.  But  all  model 
colonies,  like  model  villages,  such  as  Pullman  and  Sal- 
taire,  have  failed.  The  people  do  not  enter  into  the 
spirit  of  the  foundation;  their  object  is  to  make  their 


362  REMINISCENCES 

bread,  and  they  fret  under  regulations.  The  matter 
caused  Hughes  some  trouble  for  a  time. 

In  the  Jamaica  case,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Indian  Mu- 
tiny, when  the  savage  passion  ruled  the  hour,  it  was  not 
men  like  Thomas  Hughes,  but  the  weak  and  hysterical, 
that  were  clamouring  for  violence  and  blood. 

The  leader  of  the  Christian  Socialists  was  Frederick 
Maurice,1  a  most  sincere  lover  and  no  mean  benefactor 
of  his  kind.  He  formed  a  circle  round  him  by  his  trans- 
parent sincerity  of  aim  and  goodness  of  soul.  His 
excellence  was  practical  and  social.  As  a  thinker  he 
lacked  clearness.  I  have  heard  him  in  Lincoln's  Inn 
Chapel  preach  with  the  utmost  fervour  a  sermon  of 
which  I  could  hardly  understand  one  word.  He  was 
liberal  in  theology,  and  proscribed  by  orthodoxy  ac- 
cordingly. But  he  managed  to  persuade  himself  that 
the  Anglican  Articles  and  Creeds  were  in  reality  sym- 
bols of  freedom. 

The  Honorary  Secretary  of  the  Jamaica  Committee 
was  Mr.  Chesson,2  now  no  doubt  forgotten,  yet  not  un- 
worthy of  remembrance.  His  life  had  been  devoted  to 
the  protection  of  the  aborigines,  clients  who  could  not 
pay  their  advocates  either  in  money  or  in  fame,  and  of 

I1  Frederick  Denison  Maurice.  1805-1872.  Founded,  with 
Sterling,  the  Apostles'  Club  at  Cambridge ;  inaugurated,  and 
Principal  of,  Working  Men's  College,  London.  Professor  of  Moral 
Philosophy  at  Cambridge,  1866;  Incumbent  of  St.  Edwards, 
Cambridge,  1870-1872.] 

P  Frederick  William  Chesson  was  "for  many  years  the  inde- 
fatigable Secretary  to  the  Aborigines  Protection  Society."  He 
died  on  April  the  30th,  1888,  aged  54.] 


JAMAICA  363 

whom  the  vast  majority  probably  never  heard  of  his 
existence.  Instead  of  being  rewarded  or  honoured,  he 
had  to  undergo  much  obloquy  and  ridicule.  Here  he 
certainly  received  no  crown ;  if  the  world  is  under  moral 
government,  he  may  have  received  a  crown  elsewhere. 

The  Corn  Law  question,  the  American  question,  and 
the  Jamaica  question  threw  me  a  good  deal  among  the 
Liberal  manufacturers  of  the  North,  and  enlarged  my 
political  experience.  In  Bradford,  especially,  as  the 
guest  of  the  two  Kells,  I  learned  much  that  no  books 
could  have  taught  me.  But  moderate  Liberalism  with 
perhaps  an  occasional  turn  or  jerk  one  way  or  the  other 
remained  my  creed.  I  was  in  no  danger  of  becoming  a 
demagogue,  for  I  never  could  speak.  In  that  I  had 
neither  genius  nor  tongue.  Will  oratory  ever  lose  its 
power?  Shall  we  ever  get  back  in  this  respect  to  the 
days  of  Burley  and  the  Council-board  ?  Popular  ora- 
tory almost  inevitably  involves  exaggeration,  which 
must  surely  affect  the  soundness  of  the  mind. 

I  saw  also  a  good  deal  of  the  mechanic  on  his  political 
side.  He  is  very  sharp-witted,  but  very  open  to  novel 
opinions,  especially  of  course  to  such  as  exalt  his  class. 
It  has  been  said  of  him  that  he  is  a  Socialist  at  home  and 
a  Jingo  abroad.  A  Jingo  abroad  unhappily  he  is  apt  to 
be.  He  was  for  the  Crimean  War,  burning  Bright  in 
effigy  for  opposing  it.  He  was  for  the  Lorcha  War,  un- 
seating Bright  and  Cobden  for  voting  against  it.  He 
was  for  the  infamous  Boer  War,  than  which  there  never 
was  a  more  flagrant  breach  of  humanity  or  a  fouler 


364  REMINISCENCES 

stain  on  the  character  of  any  nation.  Extreme  excita- 
bility is  his  danger,  and  the  danger  of  the  State  in  which 
he  has  so  large  a  vote. 

Among  my  dear  friends  and  instructive  companions 
in  those  regions  were  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Winkworth  of  Bol- 
ton.  Mrs.  Winkworth  was  the  daughter  of  Mr.  Tho- 
masson,1  a  great  manufacturer  and  I  should  think  about 
the  last  of  those  who  lived  close  to  his  works  and  among 
his  men.  Now,  the  master,  if  he  is  a  man  and  not  a 
company,  lives  in  a  suburban  villa,  on  which  the  work- 
ing-man, going  out  for  his  Sunday  walk,  looks  perhaps 
with  a  sinister  eye,  thinking,  as  his  Socialist  prophet 
tells  him,  it  is  all  the  product  of  his  labour.  This  com- 
plete separation,  local  and  social,  is  a  bad  element  in  the 
case. 

The  great  problem,  however,  is  that  of  giving  em- 
ployer and  employed  if  possible  a  common  interest  in 
the  gains.  He  who  brings  this  about  would  be  one  of 
the  greatest  benefactors  of  his  kind. 

I1  Thomas  Thomasson,  chief  promoter  of  the  anti-corn  law  agi- 
tation. 1808-1876.] 


GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  ABOUT  FORTY-FIVE  YEARS  OP  AGE. 

Photograph  by  C.  H.  Howes,  of  Ithaca,  N.  Y. 


CHAPTER   XXI 

CORNELL 
1868-1871 

Resignation  of  Oxford  Professorship  —  Invitation  to  Cornell  —  Ezra 
Cornell  —  The  University  —  Cornell's  Ideas  —  Arrival  at  Ithaca 

—  Fellow-Lecturers  —  Life  at  Ithaca — The  Oneida  Community 

—  Friends  at  Cornell. 

IN  1866  I  had  to  resign  my  Oxford  Professorship  and 
take  up  my  abode  in  my  father's  house  at  Mortimer. 
In  1868,1  after  a  long  and  most  painful  illness,  my  father 
came  to  a  tragical  end,  in  consequence  of  a  malady 
which  had  its  source  in  an  injury  received  in  a  railway 
accident.  I  was  greatly  broken  by  this,  and  was  some 
time  in  recovering  mental  health  and  tone.  Having 
then  no  very  definite  object  in  life,  and  having  an  inde- 
pendent income,  I  thought  of  returning  to  America  and 
further  studying  American  history  and  institutions. 

P  So  the  MS.,  but  the  date  was  certainly  1867.  —  See  The  Gentleman's 
Magazine  for  November,  1867,  New  Series,  Volume  IV,  page  689: 
"At  Mortimer  House,  Reading,  aged  72,  Richard  Pritchard  Smith, 
esq.,  M.D.  .  .  ."  See  also  "A  History  of  the  Reading  Pathological 
Society."  By  J.  B.  Hurry.  London :  Bale,  Sons,  and  Danielsson. 
1909.  Page  55.  Besides,  in  a  letter  in  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  own 
hand  (since  received),  dated  "  Mortimer  House,  Reading,  Oct.  13, 
1867,"  and  addressed  to  "  Sir  Chas.  Russell,  Bart.,  M.P.,  Swallow- 
field,  Reading,"  occurs  the  sentence,  "My  father  was  buried  on 
Friday."  (The  letter  was  kindly  lent  me  by  Lady  Russell,  of 
Swallowfield,  widow  of  Sir  George  Russell,  Baronet,  brother  of  its 
recipient.)] 

365 


366  REMINISCENCES 

Just  then  I  had  the  good  luck  to  come  across  Andrew 
White,1  who  was  looking  out  for  Professors  for  the  new 
Cornell  University,  of  which  he  had  accepted  the  Presi- 
dency. Ezra  Cornell,2  the  founder  of  the  University, 
had  been  a  labourer  and  had  laid  telegraph  poles  with 
his  own  hands.  Having  by  a  fortunate  investment  be- 
come a  millionaire,  he  at  once  asked  what  he  could  do 
with  his  wealth  for  the  public  good.  The  Federal  Gov- 
ernment was  giving  each  State  an  allotment  of  landscrip 
to  be  employed  in  founding  a  place  of  education  with 
special  reference  to  the  improvement  of  agriculture,  and 
at  the  same  time  of  military  training.  Cornell,  advised 
by  Andrew  White,  offered,  if  the  grant  for  the  State  of 
New  York  were  put  into  his  hands,  to  meet  it  with  half 
a  million  of  his  own.  Other  States  sold  their  scrip; 
Cornell  located  that  of  New  York  in  pine  lands,  which 
afterwards  became  very  valuable  and  formed  the  chief 
endowment  of  the  University.  This  investment  was 
the  great  service  which  in  the  pecuniary  way  he  ren- 
dered to  the  enterprise. 

Equal  to  Ezra  Cornell  in  merit  and  in  his  claim  on  the 
gratitude  of  Cornellians  is  Andrew  White,  a  wealthy 
citizen  of  Syracuse,  a  man  of  the  highest  attainments 

[l  Andrew  Dickson  White,  first  President  of  Cornell  University ; 
American  Minister  at  Berlin,  also  at  St.  Petersburg ;  afterwards 
American  Ambassador  at  Berlin ;  and  has  held  various  other  high 
posts.  Born  in  1832.] 

[2  Ezra  Cornell,  born  at  Westchester  Landing,  New  York  State, 
in  1807,  of  Quaker  stock.  He  was  President  of  the  State  Agricul- 
tural Society,  and  a  Trustee  of  the  State  Agricultural  College.  He 
died  at  Ithaca  in  1874.] 


CORNELL  367 

and  culture,  who  devoted  to  the  foundation  not  only 
much  of  his  wealth,  but  labour,  which  was  of  higher 
value  and  bestowed  at  a  greater  sacrifice.  American 
wealth  has  a  bad  side.  It  has  also  a  good  and  noble  side, 
which  showed  itself  here.  Andrew  White  has  since  been 
transferred  to  another  sphere,  and  has  shone  as  a 
diplomatist  at  St.  Petersburg  and  Berlin.  He  has  also 
shone  as  a  writer.1 

Cornell's  special  object  was  to  put  within  the  reach  of 
poor  youths  the  University  training  which  in  his  own 
case  poverty  had  denied.  He  thought  that  a  young 
man  might  maintain  himself  by  the  labour  of  his  hands 
while  he  was  undergoing  a  University  education.  This 
part  of  his  scheme,  after  fair  trial,  failed  and  was  aban- 
doned. Mental  and  intellectual  labour  draw  on  the 
same  fund  of  nervous  energy,  which  in  ordinary  cases 
cannot  supply  both.  Ezra  Cornell  himself  was  a  man  of 
extraordinary  vigour  and  power  of  work.  In  the  early 
days  of  the  University  notices  were  put  up  for  students 
of  employment  in  tending  masons.  But  this  soon  came 
to  an  end.  I  am  afraid  I  rather  offended  the  good  man 
by  cautioning  young  English  mechanics  against  a  too 
hasty  acceptance  of  a  general  invitation  which  he  had 
sent  them.  I  thought  I  knew  better  than  he  could  what 
effect  his  invitation  would  have  upon  the  imagination  of 

P  Among  Mr.  White's  works  are,  "The  Warfare  of  Science," 
1876;  "History  of  the  Warfare  of  Science  with  Theology  in  Chris- 
tendom," 1897;  "Autobiography,"  1905;  "The  Warfare  of  Hu- 
manity with  Unreason,"  1906;  "Seven  Great  Statesmen,"  1910; 
also  Essays,  Addresses,  and  Speeches.] 


368  REMINISCENCES 

my  young  fellow-countrymen,  who  would  fancy  that  in 
being  admitted  to  a  University  they  were  going  to  be 
raised  at  once  socially  to  the  level  of  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge. The  rush  might  have  been  overwhelming. 

Cornell,  however,  retained  so  much  of  its  original 
character  as  to  become  a  school  of  practical  science  more 
than  of  literary  culture ;  though  the  student  of  practical 
science  probably  takes  away  that  which  raises  him  in- 
tellectually above  the  mechanic,  and  enables  him  if  he 
rises  in  life,  as  so  many  of  them  do,  to  fill  his  place  well. 

The  goodly  Chapter  Houses  of  some  of  the  Greek 
Letter  Societies  and  the  general  habits  of  a  large  class  of 
the  students  are  proofs  that  Cornell  is  not  limited  to  the 
poorer  class.  Still,  I  imagine  that  there  is  nothing  like 
the  luxury  of  the  sons  of  millionaires  at  Harvard  and 
Yale.  The  extravagant  and  costly  passion  for  athletics, 
which  had  its  source  in  the  Universities  of  the  English 
gentry,  has  invaded  in  full  force  the  American  Univer- 
sities, and  Cornell  among  the  number.  University 
authorities  ought  to  have  the  courage  and  integrity  to 
control  it.  University  education  is  already  challenged 
by  commercial  men  as  interfering  with  a  youth's  start 
in  business  life.  To  this  challenge,  if  the  student  is  to 
spend  his  time  and  his  father's  money  in  training  his 
muscles,  there  will  be  no  reply.  After  all,  no  excellence 
that  he  can  gain  in  that  way  will  put  him  on  a  level  with 
many  a  negro  porter.  I  have,  in  fact,  seen  a  negro 
porter  who  was  physically  a  finer  man  than  any  Col- 
lege athlete.  The  model  of  perfect  human  form  in  the 


CORNELL  369 

London  Museum  of  the  College  of  Surgeons  is  or  was  a 
negro,  who  we  may  be  sure  was  as  nature  had  made  him. 
A  lower  level  still  is  reached  when  the  student  becomes 
a  professional  performer  and  gate-money  is  the  object 
of  the  game.  A  University  which  permits  this  suffers 
absolute  degradation. 

My  intercourse  with  American  students  was  very  in- 
teresting and  pleasant.  They  are,  of  course,  more  in- 
dependent than  the  English  students,  and  would  hardly 
submit  to  the  same  discipline,  though  it  did  not  seem  to 
me  that  the  Faculty  feared  to  use  its  authority  at  need. 
The  political  tendencies  of  the  Americans  show  them- 
selves in  the  contests  for  the  election  of  the  officers  of 
the  Classes  and  the  Editors  of  the  College  Journal,  as 
well  as  in  a  pervading  addiction  to  rhetoric.  Their 
weakest  point  is  their  strange  and  worse  than  strange 
addiction  to  hazing,  and  to  the  bullying  of  freshmen, 
which  was  sometimes  carried  to  a  disgraceful  extent. 
It  will  be  curious  to  see  how  the  large  body  of  American 
students  to  be  imported  into  Oxford  under  the  Rhodes- 
ian  bequest  will  adapt  themselves  to  the  spirit  and  the 
habits  of  the  place.  I  cannot  say  that  I  saw  with  pleas- 
ure my  old  University  made  a  pedestal  for  the  statue  of 
such  a  man  as  Rhodes.  Nor  can  I  think  that,  unless 
the  object  is  some  special  branch  of  knowledge,  it  can  be 
a  good  thing  for  a  youth  to  be  brought  up  in  a  social  ele- 
ment different  from  that  in  which  his  life  is  to  be  passed. 

The  Greek  Letter  Societies  seemed  to  me  in  some 
measure  to  fill  the  place  filled  in  English  Universities 
2s 


370  REMINISCENCES 

by  the  College,  as  social  bonds  in  a  University  too  large 
for  anything  like  general  association.  Probably  they 
vary  in  character,  some  being  more  expensive  and  ex- 
clusive than  others,  but  I  cannot  think  that  they  are 
otherwise  than  wholesome  in  the  main.  The  records 
which  they  keep  of  the  lives  of  their  members  may  help 
in  sustaining  fidelity  to  the  path  of  honour.  I  was 
myself  a  member  of  the  Psi  Upsilon,  and  among  my 
brethren  were  Professor  Willard  Fiske  *  and  Andrew 
White. 

Ezra  Cornell  could  know  nothing  about  Universities. 
His  ideas  were  derived  from  the  establishment  of  facto- 
ries and  sawmills.  Without  the  guidance  of  Andrew 
White  he  might  have  failed.  As  it  was,  he  imperilled 
the  success  of  his  enterprise  by  placing  his  University  at 
Ithaca,  then  a  village  with  no  advantage  for  the  purpose. 
Ithaca  had  been  his  home  in  his  early  days ;  he  was  at- 
tached to  it,  and  perhaps  was  not  insensible  to  the  pleas- 
ure of  seeing  his  University  rise  on  the  hill  above  the 
spot  on  which  his  lowly  abode  had  once  stood.  "There 
is  no  enjoyment,"  says  an  Italian  writer,  " keener  than 
that  of  being  great  where  once  you  were  little."  That 
in  attracting  Professors  intellectual  exile  would  be  a 
drawback,  Ezra  could  not  understand.  He  had  been 
conjured  by  White  to  place  the  University  at  Syracuse. 
But  to  Syracuse  he  had  a  special  antipathy.  He  had 

P  Daniel  Willard  Fiske,  Librarian  and  Professor  of  North-Euro- 
pean Languages  in  Cornell  University  from  1868  to  1883.  Born 
at  Ellisburgh,  N.Y.,  in  1831 ;  died  at  Frankfurt,  Germany,  in  1904.] 


CORNELL  371 

once  stood  on  the  bridge  there  for  a  whole  day  to  be 
hired.  At  evening  he  was  hired,  but  by  a  man  who 
cheated  him  of  his  wages.  He  had  an  extremely  strong 
will,  and  hardly  anybody,  but  White,  could  have  in- 
fluenced him  on  any  subject.  Here  even  White  failed. 
However,  thanks  to  a  most  happy  choice  of  President  and 
staff,  all  had  ended  well  and  the  shade  of  Ezra  Cornell 
may  rejoice.  The  University  is  now1  a  large  society 
in  itself,  Ithaca  has  grown  into  a  little  city,  and  is  a 
healthier  place  than  a  great  city  for  young  men  taken 
from  their  homes. 

It  was  on  a  dark  November  morning  amidst  pouring 
rain,  that,  having  come  by  the  night  train  from  New 
York,  I  descended  upon  Ithaca.  I  was  met  at  the  Clin- 
ton House  by  Andrew  White.  After  breakfast,  Ezra 
Cornell  took  me  out  in  his  buggy  on  the  hill,  the  site  of 
the  University  that  was  to  be.  Nothing  could  be  less 
cheering  or  promising  than  was  then  the  aspect  of  things 
upon  that  hill.  The  University  was  represented  by  a 
single  block  of  building,  much  the  reverse  of  beautiful, 
and  looking  particularly  grim  on  that  dreary  morning. 
But  I  knew  that  there  was  sun  behind  the  cloud.  That 
sun  has  since  shone  out  with  full  lustre.  On  that  hill 
now  cluster,  on  and  round  the  fair  Campus,  the  various 
academical  buildings,  and  the  numerous  professorial 
residences  of  the  great  Cornell  University.  So  rapid  is 
the  growth  of  American  institutions.  The  site,  a  pla- 
teau looking  over  Lake  Cayuga,  is  one  of  the  finest  I 

P  This  was  written  in  1899.J 


372  REMINISCENCES 

ever  saw.  Unluckily  among  Ezra  Cornell's  gifts  was  not 
architectural  taste ;  or  perhaps  in  arranging  the  group 
of  buildings  more  advantage  might  have  been  taken  of 
the  excellence  of  the  site. 

The  opening  of  the  University  had  taken  place  a  few 
days  before  my  arrival.  I  have  always  been  sorry  that 
by  those  few  days  I  missed  being  a  pioneer.  In  my 
chequered  passage  through  life  there  is  no  happier  in- 
cident than  my  connection  with  Cornell. 

I  was  one  of  a  set  of  non-resident  Lecturers  or  Pro- 
fessors, which  included  Agassiz,1  Lowell,2  George  Curtis,* 
and  Bayard  Taylor.4  Agassiz  was  lecturing  when  I 
arrived ;  we  boarded  together  in  the  Clinton  House,  and 
for  some  weeks  I  enjoyed  his  society.  Eminent  as  a 
man  of  science,  in  character  and  habits  he  was  simple  as 
a  child.  He  never  used  a  bank,  but,  as  he  told  me,  car- 
ried his  money  in  his  pocket,  and  when  it  was  spent 
went  lecturing  to  get  more.  I  was  amused  by  his  at- 
tempt in  one  of  his  lectures,  in  deference  to  what  he  no 
doubt  deemed  a  religious  audience,  to  reconcile  with 

f1  Jean  Louis  Rodolphe  Agassiz,  a  Swiss,  born  in  1807,  went  to 
America  in  1846 ;  of  wide  scientific  reputation  in  his  day.  Died 
in  1873.] 

[2  James  Russell  Lowell,  an  eminent  poet,  essayist,  scholar,  and 
diplomatist;  born  at  Cambridge,  Mass.,  in  1819;  for  twenty 
years  Professor  of  Modern  Languages  and  Literature  at  Harvard. 
Died  in  1891.] 

[$  George  William  Curtis,  a  noted  journalist,  orator,  publicist, 
and  author.  Born  at  Providence,  R.I.,  in  1824 ;  died  in  1892.] 

[4  Bayard  Taylor,  a  poet,  a  traveller,  a  writer ;  author  of  a  long 
list  of  books.  Born  in  1825 ;  Professor  of  German  Literature  at 
Cornell ;  died  in  1878.] 


CORNELL  373 

geological  fact  the  account  in  Genesis  of  a  universal 
flood.  "If  there  is  an  overflow  of  the  Mississippi/'  said 
he, ' '  what  do  we  hear  ?  We  hear  that  the  whole  country 
is  under  water."  He  had  refused  to  receive  the  Dar- 
winian gospel  of  evolution.  In  this  he  was  unhappy; 
though  perhaps  the  account  between  him  and  Darwin 
may  not  yet  be  quite  settled.  We  are  living  too  much 
under  the  immediate  influence  of  Darwin's  mighty 
discovery  to  think  of  its  possible  limits  and  qualifi- 
cations. 

Another  of  the  set  of  Non-resident  Lecturers  was  Wil- 
liam Curtis,  an  admirable  lecturer  and  speaker  as  well  as 
writer  on  public  subjects  and  one  of  the  best  of  American 
citizens.  On  the  platform  and  as  a  journalist,  he  was 
always  a  staunch  defender  of  the  right  and  a  terror  to 
the  evil-doer.  Largely  to  his  efforts  was  due  the  reform 
of  the  Civil  Service.  Unfortunately  he  lived  in  an  elec- 
toral district  where  the  opposite  party  had  the  majority 
and  thus  by  the  fatuous  localism  which  the  Americans 
have  imposed  upon  themselves  he  was  debarred  from 
doing  his  best  for  the  country.  Democracy,  we  must 
sorrowfully  confess,  is  not  yet  large-minded. 

Lowell  was  also  one  of  the  ten.  His  anti-British 
prejudice  was  at  that  time  still  rather  strong.  I  found 
him  more  sociable  when  I  afterwards  met  him  as  Ameri- 
can Ambassador  in  England.  He  was  not  only  cured  of 
his  anti-British  prejudice,  but  largely  Anglicized,  as 
American  Ambassadors  to  England  are  apt  to  be.  It  is 
hardly  wise  to  make  them  afterwards  American  Secre- 


374  REMINISCENCES 

taries  of  State.  Mr.  Adams  l  of  course  escaped  the 
influence,  his  great  natural  strength  of  character  being 
aided  by  the  circumstances  of  a  mission  which  he  dis- 
charged with  incomparable  skill. 

Accommodation  at  Ithaca  at  first  was  scanty.  The 
mass  of  us,  Professors  and  students,  were  quartered  in 
Cascadilla,  a  huge  building  which  had  been  intended  for 
a  water-cure,  but  was  so  ill-ventilated  that  as  many 
patients  probably  would  have  been  killed  by  the  air  as 
would  have  been  cured  by  the  water.  I  had  rooms  on 
the  ground  floor  at  the  South- West  Angle,  from  which  I 
could  step  out  upon  the  platform  to  see  the  sunsets,  and, 
now  and  then,  an  eagle  hovering  over  Lake  Cayuga. 
We  had  some  material  discomforts  to  endure.  But  our 
life  was  social  and  merry.  The  people  in  the  village, 
city,  as  Ithaca  is  now,  were  kind.  I  look  back  upon 
those  days  with  pleasure.  No  years  of  my  life  have 
been  better  spent.  My  only  regret,  at  least,  is  that 
having  not  then  fully  recovered  strength  and  tone,  I 
was  below  my  proper  mark  as  a  teacher.  None  of  us 
had  anything  to  endure  like  the  load  of  anxiety  and 
trouble  which  was  nobly  borne  in  those  early  days  by 
Andrew  White.  There  was  serious  financial  difficulty 
for  a  time,  the  fund  having  been  invested  in  the  pine 
lands,  which  it  would  have  been  ruinous  at  that  time  to 
sell. 

The  country  round  the  head  of  the  two  Lakes,  Cayuga 

[l  Charles  Francis  Adams,  appointed  by  Lincoln  Minister  to 
Great  Britain,  where  he  represented  the  United  States  during  the 
Civil  War.] 


CORNELL  375 

and  Seneca,  is  very  beautiful.  I  indulged  in  excur- 
sions on  foot.  This  British  habit  the  people  could  not 
understand.  A  farmer,  if  he  overtook  me  on  the  road 
in  his  buggy,  would  kindly  offer  me  a  ride,  thinking  that 
it  was  only  for  want  of  a  horse  that  anybody  could  be 
going  on  foot.  A  farmer  with  whom  I  had  fallen  into 
conversation  said  something  that  led  me  to  think  he  took 
me  for  an  American.  I  told  him  I  was  an  Englishman. 
"Yes,"  he  said,  with  a  strong  nasal  twang,  "I  knew  you 
to  be  an  Englishman  by  your  brogue." 

A  summer  vacation  of  the  University  which  I  spent 
in  Cascadilla  was  not  an  unpleasant  time,  for  I  had  every 
evening  the  society  of  the  kindest  of  friends,  Professor 
and  Mrs.  Sprague.1  The  Professor,  who  fought  for  the 
Union  in  the  war,  was  an  American  indeed,  true  to  the 
principles  of  righteousness  on  which  the  Republic  was 
founded. 

From  Ithaca  I  visited  the  Oneida  Community,  and 
through  the  courtesy  of  Mr.  Noyes,2  its  founder  and 
dictator,  spent  two  interesting  days  there.  A  glance 
was  enough  to  show  that  the  social  problem  had  not 
been  solved  for  the  world  at  large.  The  Community 
had  grown  rich ;  was  the  owner  of  three  factories,  which 
were  run  on  the  ordinary  footing  with  hired  labour;  and 

t1  Homer  Baxter  Sprague,  at  one  time  Professor  of  Rhetoric  and 
English  Literature  at  Cornell;  a  well-known  Lecturer.  Born  at 
Sutton,  Mass.,  in  1829.  He  married  Antoinette  E.  Pardee,  of  New 
Haven,  Conn.] 

[2  John  Humphrey  Noyes,  born  in  Brattleboro,  Vt.,  in  1811 ; 
a  theologian,  preacher,  and  writer.] 


376  REMINISCENCES 

was  sitting  at  its  ease  with  a  very  comfortable  residence 
with  every  convenience  and  luxury  that  opulence  could 
afford.  For  those  who  were  learning  the  piano  there 
was  a  little  Kiosk  in  the  grounds  that  their  practising 
might  not  annoy.  Celibacy  had  been  the  rule;  but 
when  the  community  grew  wealthy,  Noyes  introduced, 
not  marriage,  but  temporary  unions  of  couples,  paired 
by  him  on  biological  principles ;  an  institution  that  ex- 
cited the  marked  displeasure  of  a  moral  neighbourhood. 
There  was  a  set  of  nurseries  in  which  the  offspring  of 
these  unions  were  reared  as  children  of  the  Community. 
With  the  acquisition  of  wealth  there  had  been  an  end  of 
proselytism ;  and  the  Community  was,  in  fact,  a  Utopian 
club  with  the  prospect,  supposing  the  last  survivor  was 
to  inherit  the  estate,  of  becoming  a  tontine.  Celibacy, 
it  seemed  to  me,  had  been  the  secret  of  success,  if  success 
other  than  material  this  could  be  called.  It  enabled 
the  Community  to  save,  and  it  removed  the  separatist 
influence  of  the  family,  which  was  the  rock  upon  which 
the  Socialist  enterprise  of  Owen  1  and  other  Utopias  had 
split.  The  same  thing  accounts  for  the  temporary 
prosperity  of  the  Shakers.  Another  necessity  seems  to 
be  a  religious  dictatorship  such  as  was  that  of  Dr. 
Noyes.  You  are  lucky  if  your  dictator  is  not  an  im- 
postor. 

I  attended  a  great  Camp  Meeting.     It  seemed  to  me 
quite  as  much  a  social  gathering  as  a  religious  commun- 
ion.    Preaching  of  a  vehement  kind  was  going  on  all  the 
p  Robert  Owen.     1771-1858.] 


CORNELL  377 

time,  and  people  were  coming  up  to  the  preacher's  stand 
and  declaring  themselves  converted.  But  there  were 
ice-cream  establishments,  and  there  was  a  good  deal, 
evidently,  of  social  enjoyment  at  the  same  time.  The 
effect  of  "Rock  of  Ages,"  however,  sung  by  the  multi- 
tude among  the  pines  and  under  the  stars,  was  very  fine. 
Most  Englishmen  who  visit  the  United  States  see 
only  the  cities,  and  all  that  is  worst  in  American  society 
and  institutions  meets  the  eye.  At  Ithaca  I  associated 
with  the  inhabitants  of  a  country  town,  and  the  infer- 
ence to  which  my  experience  led  me  was  entirely  hopeful 
and  reassuring.  I  have  ever  since  felt,  when  things 
looked  worst,  that  there  was  a  reserve  of  sound  and  in- 
telligent patriotism,  though  it  might  be  somewhat  slow 
in  coming  to  the  front.  Of  respect  for  law  the  little 
community  was  a  model.  For  police  a  single  constable 
sufficed.  When  people  went  away  from  home,  they 
merely  locked  the  doors  of  their  houses.  If  in  those 
days  there  were  occasionally  lynchings  in  Northern  or 
Western  States,  they  were,  paradoxical  as  it  may  seem, 
proofs  rather  of  respect  for  law  than  of  lawlessness. 
There  was  usually  no  need  of  a  rural  police,  and  when 
the  district  was  raided  by  train-robbers  or  horse-stealers, 
probably  a  gang  of  foreigners  from  New  York,  the 
people  were  compelled  to  take  up  arms  in  their  own 
defence.  The  fear  now  is  that  the  American  blood  may 
be  fatally  diluted  and  the  American  character,  with  its 
love  of  law  and  spontaneous  attachment  to  order,  may 
be  impaired  by  a  vast  and  miscellaneous  immigration. 


378  REMINISCENCES 

The  public  schools  may  do  much  in  the  way  of  assimila- 
tion. They  cannot  do  all.  They  cannot  at  once  assimi- 
late character,  political  or  moral. 

It  has  been  always  a  great  pleasure  to  me  to  revisit 
Cornell,  and  meet  again  my  old  friends  in  the  Profes- 
sorial Staff,  such  as  Professors  Wilder1  and  Corson.2 
Professor  Wilder  has  made  me  promise  to  bequeath  my 
brain  to  his  physiological  collection.  Whatever  he  de- 
sires I  do  with  pleasure.3  This  will  be  my  only  contri- 
bution to  science.  When  I  am  cremated,  as  I  hope  to 
be,  I  shall  be  obliged  to  the  wind  if  it  will  waft  a  grain 
or  two  of  the  ashes  to  the  Campus  of  Cornell. 

I1  Burt  Green  Wilder,  B.S.,  M.D.,  Professor  of  Neurology  and 
Vertebrate  Zoology,  Emeritus.] 

[2  Hiram  Corson,  A.M.,  LL.D.,  Litt.D.,  Professor  of  English 
Literature,  Emeritus.] 

[3But  in  the  New  York  Tribune  of  October  the  2d,  1910, 
Professor  Wilder  writes  as  follows  :  — 

"Sir,  —  The  second  instalment  of  the  'Reminiscences  of  Gold- 
win  Smith '  in  the  October  number  of  McClure's  Magazine  contains 
the  following  sentence  :  '  Professor  Wilder  has  made  me  promise 
to  bequeath  my  brain  to  his  physiological  collection.  Whatever 
he  desires  I  do  with  pleasure.' 

"  The  opening  words  must  have  been  written  by  my  dear  friend 
in  forgetfulness  of  the  following  circumstances  :  During  the  even- 
ing of  April  20,  1891,  in  my  rooms  in  Cascadilla  Place,  Ithaca, 
N.Y.,  in  the  presence  of  the  late  Henry  W.  Sage,  and  Douglas 
Boardman,  both  trustees  of  Cornell  University,  after  I  had  stated 
the  desirability  of  studying  the  brains  of  orderly  and  educated  per- 
sons, Goldwin  Smith  said  :  '  Wilder,  I  would  as  soon  you  had  my 
brain  as  my  old  hat,  and  I  wish  I  had  ten  of  them  for  you.' 

"  The  substance  of  this  declaration  was  recorded  by  me  on  the 
26th,  and  it  is  probable  that  a  copy  was  sent  to  him,  but  neither 
then  nor  subsequently  did  I  depart  from  my  rule  never  to  make  a 
direct  request  for  a  bequest  of  brain.  That  he  viewed  the  matter 
seriously  appears  from  the  fact  that,  eight  months  later,  on  January 


CORNELL  379 

Since  my  parting  from  Cornell  my  name  has  been 
given  to  a  new  Hall.  A  generation  hence  perhaps 
will  ask  what  the  owner  of  that  name  was  and  what 
he  had  done  to  merit  the  honour.  The  professor  who 
is  showing  him  over  the  Hall  will  have  some  difficulty 
in  finding  the  answer.  Canada,  or  rather  be  it  said 
Ontario,  cooped  up  as  it  is  and  severed  from  the  great 
literary  and  publishing  centres,  is  not  a  field  in  which 
literary  distinction  is  to  be  earned.  But  if  hearty 
attachment  to  the  University  and  sincere  gratitude 
for  the  relief  that  its  service  gave  him  in  a  dark 
hour,  the  name  of  Goldwin  Smith  is  not  ill  placed 
there. 

1,  1892,  he  sent  me  a  holograph  note  accompanying  a  holograph 
copy  of  a  letter  to  his  executors,  directing  them  to  deliver  his 
brain  to  me  promptly  after  his  death  ;  that  spontaneous  references 
to  the  subject  occur  in  his  letters  of  May  3, 1896  ;  November  6  and 
17, 1902,  and  September  26, 1906  ;  and  that  on  November  21,  1902, 
he  filled  out  the  regular  '  Form  of  Bequest  of  Brain,'  witnessed  by 
T.  Arnold  Haultain,  then  his  private  secretary,  now,  I  understand, 
his  literary  executor  [*]... 

"BuRT  G.  WILDER. 
"Siasconset,  Mass.,  Sept.  29,  1910."] 

*  Yes,  I  possess  a  duplicate  copy  of  this  form,  signed  and  witnessed  as  the  writer 
avers;  but  as  no  instructions  were  delivered  to  me,  I  could  not  act.  — Ed. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

VISITS  TO   EUROPE1 

Reading  —  Magdalen  —  Oxford  —  Spiritualism  —  Ignorance  of  Can- 
ada —  Knaresborough  —  Curious  Crimes  —  Italy  —  Florence  — 
Venice  —  Ravenna  —  Second  Visit  to  Italy  —  Sicily  —  The 
Mafia  —  Pizzo  —  Italian  Cruelty  —  Amalfi  —  The  Papacy  — 
Capua  —  Rome  —  Florence  again. 

FROM  time  to  time  I  re-visited  England.  Re-visiting 
the  scenes  of  one's  youth  in  age  is  a  rather  melancholy 
pleasure.  You  find  yourself  unknown  and  knowing 
nobody  where  once  you  knew  everybody  and  everybody 
knew  you.  Reading,  from  the  quiet  old  place  of  my 
childhood,  had  grown  into  a  bustling  city,  while  the 
Reading  and  Basingstoke  Railway  had  made  Mortimer, 
once  so  rural  and  secluded,  almost  a  suburb  of  Reading. 
I  was  there  the  guest  of  my  old  friend  Sir  John  Mow- 
bray,2  a  political  veteran  stored  with  reminiscences  of 
the  House  of  Commons.  At  Oxford  a  few  of  my  con- 
temporaries still  lingered,  while  some  of  my  old  pupils 
remained  as  Heads  of  Colleges  or  Professors.  But  the 
character  of  the  place,  by  the  work  of  two  reforming 
Commissions,  the  abolition  of  tests,  the  introduction  of 

P  These  were  made  in  1876-1878  ;  1881-1882 ;  1893-1894 ;  and 
1899-1900  —  this  last  was  to  Italy.] 

[2  The  Right  Honourable  Sir  John  Robert  Mowbray,  Baronet, 
P.O.,  J.P.,  D.L.,  M.P.  for  the  University  of  Oxford ;  also  for  the 
city  of  Durham,  etc.  Born  1815 ;  died  1899.] 

380 


VISITS  TO   EUROPE  381 

science,  and  the  general  progress  of  the  times,  was 
changed.  At  Magdalen,  instead  of  a  little  party  of 
Demys  which  in  my  time  encircled  the  fire  in  the  junior 
Common  Room  after  Hall,  there  was  a  full  complement 
of  undergraduates.  New  buildings  had  been  added. 
There  was  a  new  President's  Lodge,  and  in  it,  in  place  of 
the  centenarian  and  faineant  Routh,  lived  and  ruled 
the  very  active  and  highly  efficient  President,  my  friend 
Warren.1  This  was  well.  The  wealth  and  beauty  of 
Magdalen,  instead  of  being  largely  wasted,  were  being 
put  to  their  right  use.  Yet  I  could  not  refrain  from 
mentally  wafting  a  sigh  to  the  memory  of  the  unre- 
formed  Magdalen,  and  feeling  a  slight  compunction  at 
having  taken  an  active  part  in  letting  the  stir  of  a 
progressive  age  into  that  little  nook  of  unprogressive 
felicity. 

The  University  had  largely  increased  in  numbers. 
The  statute  regulating  the  admission  of  non-collegiate 
students,  drawn  long  ago  by  my  hand,  had  taken  full 
effect.  Partly  as  one  of  its  consequences,  there  had 
grown  up  in  the  north  a  new  town,  on  which  I  could  not 
help  looking  with  some  jealousy,  as  an  irruption  of  the 
common  into  the  uncommon  with  a  probable  disturb- 
ance of  the  circle  of  academic  society  which  used  to  be 
so  pleasant.  The  abolition  of  tests  had  also  done  its 
work.  There  had  grown  up  two  Non-conformist  Col- 
leges, while  Non-conformists  were  everywhere  freely 
admitted.  But  what  I  had  predicted  when  the  battle 

f1  T.  Herbert  Warren,  Vice-Chancellor,  1906  to  1910.] 


382  REMINISCENCES 

for  the  abolition  of  tests  was  being  fought  appeared  to 
have  come  to  pass.  The  Non-conformists  had  not,  as 
the  defenders  of  tests  feared,  swallowed  up  old  Oxford ; 
old  Oxford  had  rather  swallowed  the  Non-conformists. 
The  spirit  of  the  place,  aided  by  its  aesthetic  and  his- 
toric influences,  had  prevailed.  On  the  other  hand, 
science  and  intellectual  freedom  had  produced  their 
effect  on  the  Anglicans  themselves.  The  removal  of  the 
clerical  restrictions  had  largely  transferred  teaching 
and  influence  from  clerical  to  lay  hands.  Not  that  the 
medievalizing  movement  of  Pusey  and  Newman  had 
by  any  means  expired  in  its  native  and  most  congenial 
seat.  One  could  not  enter  a  church  without  seeing  that 
the  movement  still  prevailed.  It  had,  however,  as- 
sumed a  new  guise  and  one  indicative  of  waning  force. 
It  had  become  literally  Ritualist,  sustained  largely  by 
aesthetic  influences,  whereas  under  Pusey  and  Newman 
it  had  been  theological  and  was  finding  its  adherents  in 
a  weaker  class  of  minds.  Newman  was  not  Ritualistic. 
I  never  saw  his  Oratory,  but  it  was  said  that  everything 
was  very  plain. 

In  one  of  our  visits  to  England  we  found  ourselves  in 
a  boarding-house  with  a  pair  of  highly  cultivated  and 
pleasant  people  who  were  believers  in  Spiritualism ;  had 
in  fact  adopted  it  as  their  religion  and  went  to  seance  as 
to  Church.  I  was  a  sceptic,  remembering  as  I  did  the 
beginning  of  the  movement  in  table-turning  and  the 
turning  of  hats.  Our  friends  were  anxious  for  my  con- 
version. They  proposed  to  me  a  seance  with  the  first 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  383 

Medium  of  the  day,  who  was  then  in  London.  My 
curiosity  led  me  gladly  to  assent  to  the  proposal.  Going 
to  the  Medium's  abode,  I  paid  a  guinea,  as  I  should  to 
a  physician,  and  was  shown  into  a  room  where  I  waited 
for  some  time.  Presently  the  Medium  appeared,  an 
American  with  a  strong  New  England  accent.  He 
entered  into  a  desultory  conversation  with  me,  probably 
with  fishing  intent.  Then  he  announced  that  the  spirit 
Winona  had  entered  into  him  and  that  thenceforth  it 
would  be  she  that  spoke  to  me.  In  compliment  to  her 
Medium,  however,  she  spoke  with  a  strong  Yankee 
accent.  She  launched  into  a  maundering  discourse,  to 
which,  growing  impatient,  I  put  an  end  by  asking  her 
whether  I  was  married.  That  I  seemed  alone  in  the 
material  world,  yet  not  alone,  was  the  luminous  reply. 
Further  maundering  followed.  The  spirit  condoled 
with  me  on  the  ill  luck  which  had  befallen  my  nephew. 
"What  misfortune?"  I  asked,  feigning  surprise  at  the 
accuracy  of  her  information.  She  proceeded  to  give 
me  an  account  of  my  nephew's  misfortune  in  missing  a 
Government  appointment.  As  I  never  had  a  nephew, 
I  went  away  perfectly  satisfied  with  the  interview.  I 
could  not  help  suspecting  that  Winona  had  received  a 
tip,  and  that  her  prompter  had  made  a  mistake.  How 
otherwise  could  this  story  have  come  into  her  head? 
What  fantastic  tricks  will  not  pious  self-deception  play ! 
Again,  I  was  breakfasting  with  a  friend,  a  shrewd  and 
successful  man  of  business,  and  his  wife,  a  clever  woman. 
There  was  a  third  person  present  whom  I  did  not  know. 


384  REMINISCENCES 

The  Court  of  Chancery  had  just  compelled  Home,1  the 
Medium,  to  disgorge  a  large  sum  out  of  which  he  had 
swindled  an  old  woman  by  personating  the  spirit  of  her 
dead  husband.  I  referred  with  pleasure  to  the  incident. 
My  friends  looked  displeased,  and  at  last  disclosed  the 
fact  that  they  were  friends  and  disciples  of  Mr.  Home, 
to  whom  they  had  been  introduced  by  Gully,2  of  the 
Water  Cure,  who  afterwards  figured  rather  equivocally 
in  a  famous  criminal  case.  I  had  then  to  beat  a  partial 
retreat.  I  said  that  I  was  not  sceptical  by  nature,  and 
that  I  was  prepared  to  accept  facts  foreign  or  even 
opposed  to  my  own  experience  on  trustworthy  evidence. 
"Will  you  then  believe  us  if  we  tell  you  that  Mr.  Home 
held  a  seance  in  this  room  last  evening  and  that  we  saw 
that  heavy  arm-chair  advance  at  his  bidding  from  the 
corner  in  which  it  now  stands  to  the  centre  of  the 
room?"  "Certainly,"  was  my  reply;  "knowing  you 
as  I  do  to  be  perfectly  trustworthy  witnesses,  I  will  on 
your  evidence  accept  the  fact.  But  I  have  two  ques- 
tions to  ask.  Did  the  chair  move  away  from  Mr.  Home 
as  well  as  towards;  and  was  there  anybody  between 
him  and  the  chair  when  it  moved?"  Both  questions 


f1  Daniel  Dunglas  Home,  born  near  Edinburgh  in  1833 ;  died  at 
Auteuil  in  1886.  —  He  is  the  "Sludge"  in  Browning's  "Sludge  the 
Medium"  (published  in  1864).] 

[2  James  Manby  Gully.  He  and  James  Wilson  introduced  the 
hydropathic  treatment  of  disease  at  Malvern  about  1842.  He  is 
the  "Dr.  Gullson"  of  Charles  Reade's  "It  is  Never  too  Late  to 
Mend."  —  The  case  referred  to  was  known  as  the  "  Bravo  case." 
A  Mrs.  Bravo  was  suspected  of  poisoning  her  husband.  Disclosures 
showed  Gully's  intimacy  with  the  lady.  Born  1808 ;  died  1883.] 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  385 

had  to  be  answered  in  the  negative.  The  impostor  no 
doubt  pulled  the  chair  to  him  with  a  horse-hair  line. 
The  light  was  imperfect,  and  the  witnesses,  blinded  by 
their  faith,  and  by  the  solemnity  of  the  quack,  allowed 
themselves  to  be  imposed  upon  by  a  trick  which  they 
would  at  once  have  detected  had  it  been  played  by  a 
common  conjurer. 

I  saw  another  case  of  spiritualism  in  which  I  thought 
the  illusion  was  evidently  produced  by  a  yearning  for 
intercourse  with  the  dead.  In  connection  with  this 
case  I  was  brought  into  contact  with  a  female  Medium 
who  was  evidently  the  coarsest  of  impostors  and  whose 
juggling  apparatus  could  deceive  no  cool-headed  ob- 
server. But  before  these  pages  are  in  print  Spiritual- 
ism will  have  passed  away. 

In  those  days  one  encountered  curious  proofs  of 
British  ignorance  of  Canada.  On  the  door  of  Knares- 
borough  Church  I  read  a  proclamation  by  the  Privy 
Council  relating  to  the  Colorado  Beetle,  a  visitation  of 
which  was  expected,  beginning,  "Whereas  intelligence 
has  been  received  from  Ontario,  Canada,  that  the  coun- 
try round  that  town,  etc."  Within  a  few  days  after- 
wards I  fell  in  with  three  Privy  Councillors,  and  when  I 
next  went  to  Knaresborough  Church  the  proclamation 
had  disappeared.  At  one  place  our  landlady,  a  well- 
educated  woman,  could  hardly  be  brought  to  believe 
that  my  wife's  maid  was  a  Canadian,  as  she  was  not  red. 
I  was  invited  to  an  emigration  meeting  at  a  city  remark- 
able for  intelligence.  The  Alabama  question  had  just 
2c 


386  REMINISCENCES 

been  settled  by  the  treaty  of  Washington.1  I  spoke, 
dwelling  on  the  good  feelings  of  Canadians  towards  the 
Mother-country.  I  was  followed  by  a  gentleman, 
evidently  well-educated  and  a  good  speaker.  He  said 
that  he  had  listened  with  particular  pleasure  to  what  I 
had  said  about  the  feeling  of  Canadians  towards  the 
Mother-country,  and  that  he  hoped,  now  that  the  Ala- 
bama question  was  settled,  there  would  be  nothing  to 
divide  the  two  countries  from  each  other.  The  audience 
showed  no  surprise.  A  considerable  change  has  since 
that  time  been  made  by  assiduous  " advertising"  of 
Canada,  and  still  more  by  the  South  African  war.  Yet 
it  seems  more  than  doubtful  whether  the  masses  in  the 
two  countries  can  ever  be  brought  to  know  each  other 
and  to  think  and  act  together  sufficiently  for  the  pur- 
pose of  Imperial  Federation. 

Knaresborough  is  the  scene  of  the  story  of  Eugene 
Aram,  whose  character  has  been  sentimentally  trans- 
figured by  Bulwer,2  but  who  was  really  a  mercenary 
murderer,  though  he  was  cultivated  and  literary,  as  he 
showed  in  his  defence.  We  had  something  like  a  coun- 
terpart of  him  at  Ithaca  in  the  person  of  one  Ruloff, 
who  in  a  remarkable  way  combined  criminal  propensi- 
ties with  literary  tastes,  being  a  great  philologist,  and 
engaged  in  the  invention  of  a  universal  language.  Ru- 
loff committed  a  series  of  robberies  and  murders,  the 
series  of  murders  beginning  with  those  of  his  wife  and 

P  February  the  9th,  1871.] 

[2  Bulwer  Lytton's  "Eugene  Aram"  was  published  in  1832.] 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  387 

daughter.  On  that  occasion  he  escaped  justice  through 
the  absence  of  a  corpus  delicti,  Lake  Cayuga,  into  which 
he  had  thrown  the  bodies,  being  undredgable.  He 
wandered  into  Virginia,  where  he  committed  other 
crimes,  all  the  time  working  at  philology  and  his  univer- 
sal language.  Returning  to  his  old  haunts,  he  again 
committed  robbery  and  murder,  and  again  fell  into  the 
hands  of  justice.  The  opponents  of  capital  punishment 
petitioned  against  his  execution  on  the  stock  plea  of 
insanity,  and  on  the  somewhat  inconsistent  ground  that 
he  had  invented  a  universal  language  and  that  by  hang- 
ing him  a  light  of  science  would  be  put  out.  The  Gov- 
ernor of  the  State  issued  two  Commissions  of  Inquiry, 
one  to  report  on  each  plea.  Both  reported  in  the  nega- 
tive, and  Ruloff  was  hanged.  His  forehead,  in  the  cast 
which  was  taken,  bespeaks  intellect,  but  the  width  of 
the  head  between  the  ears  gives  it  the  aspect  of  that  of 
a  bull. 

My  early  Alpine  tours  embraced  the  Southern  slope  of 
the  Alps.  Otherwise  I  did  not  see  Italy  till  late  in  life, 
when  I  had  settled  in  Canada.  Then  I  unspeakably 
enjoyed  it.  I  hardly  needed  a  guide;  every  object  was 
already  familiar.  The  greatest  surprise  was  the  ancient 
sculpture,  which  I  found  I  was  far  from  having  seen  in 
seeing  the  casts.  The  tact  of  my  courier  just  saved  me 
from  entering  Pompeii  with  a  "caravan"  of  German 
"tourists,"  whom  we  found  drinking  beer  in  the  restau- 
rant. What  you  bring  back  from  a  tour  depends  on 
what  you  take  to  it,  and  probably  most  of  the  people 


388  REMINISCENCES 

of  that  caravan  brought  little  with  them  to  Italy.  Does 
the  touring  which  is  now  the  universal  rage  do  the  mass 
of  tourists  more  good  by  enlarging  their  ideas  than  it 
does  them  harm  by  taking  them  away  from  their  duties 
in  life  ? 

At  the  lovely  Carthusian  Monastery  near  Florence  I 
was  received  by  a  monk  with  a  figure  so  austere  and 
venerable  that  I  was  ashamed  to  use  him  as  a  showman. 
He  bowed  at  all  the  altars,  and  appeared  to  be  a  model 
of  devotion.  He  showed  me  cells  in  which  the  Brethren 
were  immured,  with  orifices  through  which  their  meals 
were  passed  to  them.  At  last  he  pointed  to  a  door, 
telling  me  that  on  going  through  it  I  should  see  a  view, 
with  an  air  which  seemed  to  imply  that  views  might 
have  their  attractions  for  children  of  this  world.  The 
view  was  lovely.  But  as  I  was  looking  at  it,  what  was 
my  surprise  to  hear  behind  my  back  the  moiik  and  my 
man  chaffing  each  other  about  the  quality  of  the  liqueur 
made  at  different  monasteries.  When  I  turned  round, 
the  monk's  austerity  had  vanished.  We  went  to  the 
pharmacia  and  "  liquored  up."  Coming  away  I  said  to 
my  man,  "You  seem  to  know  that  monk."  "Yes,  he 
was  once  a  brown  begging  friar  at  Rome."  "But  is 
that  man  going  to  be  shut  up  in  one  of  those  cells  and 
to  have  his  meals  passed  to  him  through  a  hole  in  the 
wall?"  "Oh,  since  the  Monastery  has  been  reduced, 
they  have  relaxed  the  rule." 

The  monks  and  nuns  from  the  dissolved  or  reduced 
monasteries,  I  was  told,  had  generally  been  glad  to  get 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  389 

back  to  domestic  life ;  a  fact  which  threw  some  light  on 
the  dissolution  of  the  monasteries  in  England.  Lovely 
homes  of  monasticism,  such  as  the  Benedictine  Monas- 
tery at  Bologna  and  that  of  San  Martino  at  Naples, 
remained,  when  I  was  last  in  Italy,  on  the  hands  of  the 
Government.  Will  a  new  spirit  ever  take  up  its  abode 
in  them  and  struggle  against  the  ascendency  of  material- 
ism as  monasticism  in  its  way  and  measure  struggled 
against  the  ascendency  of  brute  force  in  the  feudal 
era? 

To  be  for  the  first  time  in  Venice  when  your  mind 
and  knowledge  are  mature  is  the  realization  of  a  dream. 
I  fortunately  got  there  before  a  steamer  had  begun  to 
run  upon  the  Grand  Canal  and  some  time  before  the 
fall  of  the  Campanile;  a  catastrophe  which  is  irrepa- 
rable, for  the  old  memories  will  never  gather  round  the 
new  building.  This  will  not  be  the  tower  from  which 
Antonio  scanned  the  horizon  for  his  over-due  argosies, 
or  the  sight  of  which  greeted  the  eye  of  the  Venetian 
mariner  returning  from  Oriental  trade  or  Turkish  war. 
The  Dogana  and  St.  Mark's  seem  to  be  imperilled.  The 
piles  surely  must  give  way  in  time.  Venice  "rose  like 
an  exhalation  from  the  deep."  Into  the  deep  like  an 
exhalation  she  may  return.  Better  almost  this  than 
that  she  should  become  a  vulgar  trading  town. 

Ruskin  was  there  sketching.  Are  we  bound  to 
share  his  present  admiration  for  St.  Mark's?  To 
me,  I  confess,  it  seemed  more  interesting  as  symbolic 
of  the  half  Oriental  piety  of  a  race  of  commercial 


390  REMINISCENCES 

adventurers  than  transcendently  beautiful.  It  surely 
is  too  dark. 

The  piombi  are  the  grim  memorials  of  that  wonderful 
oligarchy  which  for  so  many  centuries,  while  it  deprived 
the  people  of  political  life  and  thought,  gave  them  free- 
dom from  the  political  convulsions  of  Florence  and  the 
other  democratic  republics,  with  security  for  the  life  of 
trade,  literature,  art,  and  the  brothel. 

Another  vision  of  the  past  was  Ravenna,  a  city  of 
ancient  history  preserved  in  its  antiquity  and  silence  by 
the  silting  up  of  the  harbour, where  once  the  Roman  fleet 
rode  at  anchor,  and  by  the  malarious  rice  grounds. 
Byzantine  work  is  that  of  a  decadence.  Mosaic  is  not 
art.  Yet  the  churches  have  a  certain  magnificence, 
besides  the  intense  interest  of  their  antiquity.  The 
portraits  of  Justinian  and  his  court  are  apparently 
genuine,  though  barbaresque.  Here  is  a  Roman  Em- 
peror, though  one  of  the  lowest  decadence,  in  his  own 
tomb.  A  Roman  Empress  was  actually  to  be  seen  in 
hers  till  some  profane  urchins  threw  in  a  lighted  match. 
"Old  Ravenna's  immemorial  wood"  of  Italian  pines 
was  also  profoundly  impressive  when  I  was  there;  I 
believe  it  has  since  been  decaying.  Ravenna,  if  it  was 
in  Dante's  time  anything  like  what  it  is  now,  must  have 
been  a  suitable  place  of  exile  for  the  writer  of  "Purga- 
tory" and  "Hell."  I  admire,  but  I  never  could  love, 
the  poet  who  had  painted  God  as  the  creator  and  keeper 
of  a  torture-house  unspeakably  worse  than  that  of  the 
most  execrable  of  Italian  tyrants. 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  391 

Ravenna  by  this  time  no  doubt  swarms  with  tourists 
" doing"  its  antiquities.  Though  the  spell  might  be 
impaired  by  the  crowd,  one  might  be  glad  that  the  en- 
joyment was  shared,  were  it  certain  that  it  was  real,  not 
a  formal  course  of  sight-seeing  from  which  no  idea  or 
impression  is  carried  away. 

My  visit  to  Italy  was  repeated  in  1899  when  I  went  in 
company  with  my  dear  wife  and  our  friend  Miss  Crooks, 
now  Mrs.  Burns.1  Then  it  took  in  Sicily.  I  saw  the 
Temple  of  Concord  at  Girgenti  standing  on  the  silent 
shores,  a  lovely  mourner  over  the  grave  of  the  mighty 
Agrigentum.  I  saw  the  great  harbour  of  Syracuse 
where  Athenian  Imperialism  had  met  its  doom,  and 
the  quarries  which  had  been  its  tragic  prison-house. 
I  saw  the  divine  Landscape  of  Taormina.  I  saw  Pa- 
lermo with  its  broad  valley  lying  among  the  hills,  a  dark 
green  expanse  of  orange  and  lemon  groves,  with  its 
ravishing  Chapel  Royal,  and  still  more  ravishing  Church 
of  Monreale.  On  the  night  when  I  was  at  Palermo  took 
place,  amidst  a  scene  of  the  greatest  popular  excitement, 
the  arrest  of  Palizzolo,  a  local  magnate  and  chief  of  the 
Mafia,  for  the  murder  of  his  enemy  Notabartolo.2  The 
murder  had  been  committed  several  years  before,  but 
the  murderer's  political  influence  had  prevented  the 

[l  A  daughter  of  the  late  Robert  Pilkington  Crooks,  of  Osgoode 
Hall,  Toronto,  and  widow  of  Captain  A.  Norman  Burns,  of  the  49th 
(late  Princess  Charlotte  of  Wales's)  Regiment.] 

[2  In  1893  Signor  Notarbartolo,  a  Governor  of  the  Bank  of  Sicily, 
accused  Palizzolo,  a  brother-Governor,  of  fraud.  A  week  or  two 
afterwards  his  dead  body  was  found,  covered  with  wounds.] 


392  REMINISCENCES 

passing  by  the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  of  which  he  was  a 
member,  of  the  resolution  necessary  to  put  a  Deputy 
on  his  trial.  Thus  for  years  murder  had  stalked  the 
streets  of  Palermo,  defying  justice,  while  those  streets 
were  full  of  soldiery.  At  last  a  strong  Prime  Minister 
carried  the  resolution,  stopped  the  post  and  telegraph, 
and  pounced  upon  Palizzolo.  The  venue  was  changed 
to  Milan,  conviction  in  Sicily  being  hopeless.  But 
when  I  left  Italy,  the  court  had  got  no  further  than 
committing  twenty  witnesses  for  refusing  to  give  evi- 
dence against  the  Mafia. 

Matters  were  not  much  better  at  Naples  where  the 
Camorra  domineered.  Miss  Crooks  was  robbed  of  her 
reticule  in  one  of  the  principal  streets  at  midday  by  a 
man  who  then  jumped  into  a  cab  and  was  going  off 
when  he  was  collared  by  a  bersaglieri.  We  received  a 
friendly  hint  that  we  had  better  leave  Naples.  Had 
there  been  a  trial,  there  might  really  have  been  some 
risk.  Luckily  the  robber  proved  to  be  a  ticket-of-leave 
man  and  was  remanded  to  prison  on  his  former  sentence. 
The  career  of  Mussolino  and  the  sympathy  felt  for  the 
savage,  show  how,  when  the  law  has  been  for  centuries 
the  enemy  of  the  people,  the  people  become  the  enemies 
of  the  law.  Nor,  when  I  was  at  Naples,  had  the  law,  or 
at  least  the  Government,  become  the  people's  friend. 
Half  the  morsel  of  coarse  bread  and  the  cup  of  meagre 
wine  were  being  taken  from  the  lips  of  poverty  to  pay 
for  the  share  of  Italy  in  the  Imperialist  and  Militarist 
craze.  The  squalid  misery  in  Naples  was  frightful. 


VISITS   TO   EUROPE  393 

On  my  way  back  from  Sicily,  through  the  irregularity 
of  the  Italian  railway  service,  I  found  myself  stranded 
for  the  night  at  Pizzo  in  Calabria,  the  place  where  Murat, 
landing  with  revolutionary  designs,  got  himself  shot; 
a  late  sacrifice  to  the  manes  of  the  thousands  whom  the 
ruffian  had  massacred  at  Madrid.  A  darker  or  more  sin- 
ister-looking place  I  had  never  beheld  than  that  little 
Calabrian  town.  The  filth  of  the  inn  was  unspeakable. 
But  the  courtesy  of  the  people  whom  I  found  at  supper 
in  the  saloon,  probably  the  heads  of  Pizzo  society, 
nothing  could  exceed.  In  the  morning  I  heard  under 
my  window  a  noise  which  reminded  me  of  the  chorus 
of  frogs.  Looking  out,  I  saw  all  Pizzo  gathered  in  the 
square  and  holding  its  early  conversazione.  Ragged 
and  dirty  in  the  highest  degree  the  company  were. 
But  they  seemed,  and  let  us  hope  that  they  were,  as 
merry  as  multi-millionaires  or  crickets. 

The  Italians  are  the  worst  of  horse  masters.  Nothing 
can  exceed  their  cruelty.  There  is  no  use  in  remon- 
strating. There  might  be  some  danger;  for  they  are 
not  less  peppery  than  courteous.  In  fact,  an  envoy  of 
the  Society  for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to  Animals 
who  pulled  up  a  savage  at  Naples  was  thrashed  within 
an  inch  of  his  life.  I  was  told  that  the  Pope,  when  they 
appealed  to  him  on  the  subject,  said  that  Christians 
owed  no  duty  to  brutes.  This  was  scarcely  credible  of 
Leo  XIII.  He  would  have  known  that  even  if  Chris- 
tians owed  no  duty  to  brutes  they  owed  some  to  them- 
selves. In  Sicily  I  saw  a  goat  hitched  up  to  a  wall  so 


394  REMINISCENCES 

that  it  could  only  touch  the  ground  with  its  hind  legs. 
If  I  had  rebuked  the  barbarian,  he  would  very  likely 
have  drawn  his  knife.  The  poor  little  Italian  horses 
do  not  deserve  the  treatment  which  they  get.  A  pair  of 
them  trotted  with  me  and  my  courier  from  Salerno  to 
Sorrento,  eight  hours,  with  little  more  than  an  hour  of 
rest,  and  came  in  as  lively  as  they  went  out.  I  longed 
to  give  the  poor  little  fellows  an  extra  feed,  but  I  knew 
that  I  should  be  only  giving  an  extra  feed  or  drink  to 
the  driver. 

Amain  is  now  a  petty  town,  and  could  never  have 
been  a  large  city.  But  romantic  interest  attaches  to 
it  as  the  cradle  of  scientific  navigation.1  "  Empire," 
which  we  are  now  told  is  political  bliss,  was  then  happily 
far  away  in  Germany,  and  a  chance  was  given  for  that 
free  and  emulous  development  which  produced  the 
Italian  Republics.  On  the  day  when  I  halted  at  Amalfi 
preparations  were  being  made  for  an  annual  miracle,  an 
exudation  from  the  bones  of  St.  Andrew,  which  Amal- 
fian  mariners  had  been  so  fortunate  as  to  secure,  prob- 
ably from  some  Byzantine  relic-monger,  in  the  Middle 
Ages.  This  is  a  counterpart  of  the  liquefaction  of  the 
blood  of  St.  Januarius.  A  terrible  millstone  these  an- 
nual thaumaturgies  must  be  round  the  neck  of  the  Cath- 
olic Church,  which  cannot  go  on  performing  them  with- 
out forfeiting  the  allegiance  of  the  educated  or  discon- 
tinue them  without  forfeiting  the  allegiance  of  the  people. 

P  The  introduction  of  the  mariner's  compass  has  been  attributed 
to  Flavio  Gioia,  a  citizen  of  Amalfi,  in  1307.] 


VISITS  TO  EUROPE  395 

Of  the  allegiance  of  the  educated,  it  is  true,  there  is 
not  much  left  to  be  forfeited.  The  tone  of  the  drawing- 
room,  I  was  told,  was  almost  universally  sceptical.  A 
few  old  families,  mostly  of  Papal  creation,  are  rather 
politically  than  theologically  devout.  Yet  the  position 
of  the  Prisoner  of  the  Vatican,  if  he  could  only  see  it,  is 
one  of  far  greater  influence,  as  well  as  far  more  respect- 
able, than  was  that  of  the  Temporal  lord  of  Rome.  It 
bears  a  certain  resemblance  to  the  Papacy  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  though  Democracy  and  Science  do  not  go  to 
Canossa.  It  is  in  fact  a  crucial  proof  of  the  elevation 
which,  as  well  as  freedom,  a  Church  gains  by  separation 
from  the  State. 

Passing  Capua,  I  thought  I  could  mark  the  spot  on 
the  hillside  where  Hannibal  must  have  stood  with  his 
staff  looking  down  on  the  besieged  city  and  thinking 
how  he  could  relieve  it.  The  result  was  his  ineffectual 
march  on  Rome.  Why  had  he  not  marched  on  Rome 
after  Cannae?  He  could  not  have  besieged  the  city, 
as  he  had  no  siege-train ;  but  he  might  have  starved  it. 
His  own  army  could  well  have  subsisted  on  the  country ; 
and  he  would  have  paralyzed  the  confederacy  of  which 
Rome  was  the  head.  But  his  judgment  was  that  of  the 
greatest  captain,  probably,  as  well  as  the  most  striking 
figure  in  military  history.  It  might  be  conjectured  that 
after  Cannae  his  mercenaries  grew  riotous  and  demanded 
immediate  reward ;  but  never,  not  even  in  his  passage  of 
the  Alps,  in  his  terrible  march  through  the  floods,  or  at 
the  end  of  his  fortunes,  does  he  seem  to  have  lost  control. 


396  REMINISCENCES 

"Rome,  Rome,  thou  art  no  more!"  I  believe  says 
the  song.  Classic  Rome  really  is  no  more.  It  is  over- 
laid and  dwarfed  by  Modern  Rome.  Why  cannot  his- 
toric places  such  as  Rome  and  Venice  be  kept  historic  ? 
Why  must  we  have  a  London  quarter  on  the  Quirinal 
and  steamboats  on  the  Grand  Canal?  Who  now  can 
meditate  upon  the  ruins  of  Rome?  The  ruins  are  lost 
in  the  modern  city.  The  aqueducts,  the  roads,  and  the 
tombs  beside  the  roads  alone  speak  of  ancient  Rome. 
Rome  never  was  the  capital  of  Italy.  She  was  the 
capital  of  the  world.  For  a  capital  of  the  world  her 
position  was  good.  For  a  capital  of  Italy  it  is  not. 
I  can  sympathize  with  Hare's  jeremiads, *  though  not 
from  his  ecclesiastical  point  of  view.  New  Italy  is  the 
newest  of  nations.  She  should  have  had  a  new  capital. 
A  fine  site  for  one  would  have  been  the  Alban  Mount. 

To  Thomas  Arnold  the  moment  on  which  he  first 
caught  sight  of  Rome  was  about  the  most  solemn  in  his 
life.  I  ought  to  have  shared  that  great  man's  feelings, 
but  I  did  not.  If  ever  the  Papacy  was  a  blessing,  or 
other  than  a  curse,  it  must  have  been  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
when  it  balanced,  if  it  did  not  much  temper,  feudal 
force.  But  of  medieval  Rome  there  is  scarcely  a  trace. 
For  the  ecclesiastical  Rome  of  later  days  I  feel  no  re- 
spect. Nor  do  the  hundred  temples  of  its  sacerdotalism 
and  wafer- worship,  with  their  somewhat  meretricious 
splendour,  greatly  impress  me.  St.  Peter's,  with  its 

[l  See  Augustus  J.  C.  Hare's  "  Walks  in  Rome,"  passim.  —  London  : 
George  Allen  ;  New  York  :  George  Routledge  &  Sons.] 


VISITS   TO   EUROPE  397 

vast  and  luminous  grandeur,  must  impress  every 
one;  but  hardly  in  a  religious  way.  Besides,  here 
also  you  are  confronted  with  false  relics  and  other 
lies.  It  was  ancient  Rome,  I  presume,  the  centre  of 
conquest  and  the  seat  of  empire,  that  stirred  Arnold's 
feelings  most  and  filled  him  with  almost  religious  ec- 
stasy when  he  first  caught  sight  of  the  city.  I  do  not 
love  conquest ;  I  believe  in  nationality ;  in  the  emulous 
variety  of  nations ;  and  I  doubt  the  beneficence  of  any 
Empire,  even  of  that  of  Rome,  though  of  what  history 
would  have  been  without  the  Roman  Empire  we  can 
hardly  form  an  idea. 

There  had  been  one  very  remarkable  addition  to  the 
sights  of  Rome  between  my  first  visit  and  my  second. 
Not  very  far  from  the  Church  where,  in  his  shrine  of 
lapis  lazuli  and  gold,  rests  the  founder  of  the  Society  of 
Jesus,  now  stands  the  statue  of  Giordano  Bruno,  with  the 
inscription  "To  Giordano  Bruno,  on  the  Spot  where  he 
Suffered  Death  by  Fire,  the  Age  which  he  Foresaw." 
The  erection  of  that  statue  cut  Papacy  to  the  heart. 
Nor  can  "Baptist  Church,"  flaunting  in  large  letters  on 
a  building  in  a  Roman  street,  be  agreeable  to  the  Papal 
eye. 

Roman  Catholicism  is  dead  at  the  root  as  a  system  of 
belief,  besides  being  weighed  down  by  its  load  of  historic 
crime.  To  its  pretensions  as  a  system  of  morality,  the 
moral  state  of  Catholic  countries  of  Italy,  its  centre, 
above  all,  is  the  decisive  reply.  Yet  it  is  still,  to  use 
Macaulay's  happy  phrase,  an  august  and  fascinating 


398  REMINISCENCES 

superstition,  and,  to  simple  multitudes,  it  is  the  only 
spiritual  influence  and  the  only  poetry  of  life. 

I  feel  more  interest  in  Florence,  that  miraculous 
city,  which  with  a  population  never  amounting  to  a 
hundred  thousand  and  perpetually  torn  by  faction, 
produced  such  wealth  of  literature  and  art,  to  say 
nothing  of  manufactures  and  finance.  Happy  Florence 
to  have  escaped  being  a  political  capital  of  Italy! 
Happy  Florence  in  having  no  coal  or  anything  to  turn 
her  into  a  manufacturing  city!  Art  is  her  proper  in- 
dustry. Her  dower  is  the  sense  of  beauty  which  shows 
itself  in  the  commonest  objects;  in  the  flower-market, 
in  the  very  arrangement  of  goods  in  the  stores.  Some 
very  pleasant  days  were  passed  in  the  Villa  Landor, 
where,  in  what  was  once  the  abode  of  that  eccentric 
and  crabbed  genius,1  my  Cornell  friend,  Professor  Fiske, 
was  living  in  elegant  luxury  and  entertaining  with 
Medicean  grace.  Pleasant  and  instructive  hours  were 
passed  with  Signer  Pasquale  Villari,2  the  eminent  Pro- 
fessor of  history  and  member  of  a  Senate  which  is 
chosen  for  personal  distinction  in  the  different  lines. 
Should  the  crash  come  which  prodigal  misgovernment 
on  one  side  and  the  consequent  growth  of  Socialism  on 
the  other  seem  to  threaten,  the  Senate  might  prove  the 
anchor  of  the  storm-tossed  State. 

['Walter  Savage  Landor,  author  of  "  Imaginary  Conversations," 
etc.  Born  1775  ;  died  1864.] 

[2  Signor  Pasquale  Villari,  honorary  D.C.L.  of  Oxford  ;  honorary 
Doctor  of  Edinburgh  and  Halle ;  Vice-President  of  the  Senate  of 
Italy ;  author  of  several  historical  and  social  works.  Born  in  1827.] 


GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  SEVENTY- FIVE  YEARS  OF  AGE. 

Photograph  by  Dixon,  of  Toronto. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

VISITS   TO   WASHINGTON 

Settling  in  Canada  —  Washington  —  Bancroft  —  Bayard  —  The 
Pensions  Bill  —  The  Capitol  —  American  Oratory  —  American 
Statesmanship  —  Washington  Society  —  The  Party  System  — 
Newspaper  Reporters  —  E.  L.  Godkiii. 

Two  years  were  spent  happily  at  Cornell  in  lecturing 
to  my  class  in  history,  watching  the  vigorous  growth 
and  happy  promise  of  the  young  University,  and  en- 
joying the  society  of  its  good  Founder,  Ezra  Cornell. 
Then  my  strong  domestic  tastes  carried  me  to  Canada 
where  three  branches  of  my  family  were  settled,  and 
where  I  should  still  be  near  Cornell. 

From  time  to  time,  when  settled  in  Canada,  I,  with 
my  wife,  visited  Washington,  which  was  always  growing 
in  brilliancy,  architectural  and  social.  It  is  the  only 
great  city  on  this  continent  that  is  permanently  and 
securely  well  governed.  Instead  of  being  under  an 
elective  Council  of  ward  politicians,  it  is  under  three 
Commissioners  appointed  by  the  President  of  the 
United  States.  Here  the  problem  of  municipal  gov- 
ernment, supposed  to  be  insolvable,  is  solved  if  other 
cities  would  accept  the  solution.  They  will  never  get 
out  of  the  slough  of  mal-administration  and  corruption 

399 


400  REMINISCENCES 

in  which  they  are  all  wallowing  while  they  hug  the 
elective  system  and  government  by  ward  politicians. 

A  thing  that  strikes  one  in  the  new  city  is  the 
predominance  of  the  military  element  in  the  statuary  of 
the  squares.  Why  is  it  that  the  Americans,  an  industrial 
people,  are  such  worshippers  of  military  glory  ?  Why 
was  the  figure  chosen  to  stand  in  front  of  the  White 
House  the  victor,  if  it  could  be  called  a  victory,  of  New 
Orleans,  ramping  on  a  war-horse  when  he  ought  to  be 
crouching  behind  a  cotton-bale?1  Why  have  there 
been  so  many  military  Presidents  and  nominees  for  the 
Presidency,  while  England,  an  old  war-power,  has  had 
only  one  military  Prime  Minister,  and  that  one  chosen, 
not  on  military  grounds,  but  because  he  was  one  of  the 
leading  statesmen  of  Europe  ? 2 

I  was  elected  a  member  of  the  Cosmos  Club,  and  there 
had  pleasant  and  instructive  talks.  My  old  friend  Mr. 
Bancroft  had  taken  up  his  winter  abode  in  the  city, 
and  I  often  dropped  in  to  make  up  a  rubber  for  him  in 
the  evening.  Why  cannot  Progress  let  whist,  the  solace 
of  old  age,  alone  ?  Why  turn  it  into  bridge  whist,  or 
destroy  by  the  intrusion  of  mechanical  science  the  in- 
terest of  planning  your  own  game  ?  My  private  con- 
viction is  that  whist,  as  it  was  played  in  my  youth,  and 
as  Sarah  Battle  played  it,  with  ten  points  and  honours, 
was  really  the  best  of  all.  It  was  a  happy  mixture  of 

P  Andrew  Jackson,  the  seventh  President  of  the  United  States. 
He  defeated  the  English  under  General  Sir  Edward  Pakenham  at 
New  Orleans  in  1815.] 

[2The  Duke  of  Wellington,  Prime  Minister  1829-1830.] 


VISITS  TO   WASHINGTON  401 

skill  and  luck,  and  gave  room  for  interesting  vicissitudes 
of  fortune  in  the  course  of  a  game. 

Bancroft  had  preserved  his  health  and  his  powers  of 
work  into  old  age  by  a  careful  regimen.  Like  Bethell, 
he  worked  early  in  the  morning.  He  took  regular  horse- 
exercise  till  very  late  in  life.  When  he  could  no  longer 
ride,  he  took  to  driving,  which,  as  he  was  apt  to  let 
the  reins  drop,  was  rather  perilous  to  himself  and  to  his 
companion.  When  he  took  my  wife  out  for  a  drive, 
I  was  glad  to  get  her  back  safe. 

One  of  my  great  friends  at  Washington  was  Mr. 
Bayard,1  a  thoroughly  high-bred  and  honourable  poli- 
tician. He  was  not  the  less  admirable  in  my  eyes  for 
having  at  the  outbreak  of  Secession  bravely  spoken 
against  war ;  though  his  voice  had  been  drowned  in  the 
roar  of  onset  and  he  had  long  suffered  in  popularity  as 
having  been  unpatriotic,  when  in  truth  he  had  behaved 
like  the  best  of  patriots.  One  of  his  claims  to  my 
esteem  was  that  he  was  a  sound  free-trader.  He  was 
afterwards  Ambassador  to  England,  and  there  dis- 
tinguished himself  as  an  envoy  of  peace  and  friendship. 
It  might  be  ungracious  to  say  that  with  the  highest  of 
motives  he  somewhat  overdid  the  part.  An  American 
Ambassador  to  England  should  be  cautious  how  he 
allows  himself  to  be  brought  under  the  spell  of  London 
Society.  He  should  remember  that  he  is  an  ambassa- 

I1  Thomas  Francis  Bayard.  He  was  Secretary  of  State  from 
1885  to  1889;  appointed  Ambassador  to  Great  Britain  in  1893. 
Born  in  1828.] 

2D 


402  REMINISCENCES 

dor,  the  representative  of  a  separate  and  occasionally 
conflicting  interest.  I  have  touched  on  this  point  al- 
ready in  the  case  of  Lowell. 

I  think  it  was  Bayard  that  invited  me  just  after  the 
inauguration  of  the  President  to  accompany  him  in  a 
call  at  the  White  House.  I  demurred,  saying  that  I  had 
no  business  or  right  to  intrude.  My  friend  assured  me 
that  the  President  would  be  glad  to  see  me.  I  really 
believe  he  was.  The  White  House  absolutely  swarmed 
with  office-seekers,  some  of  whom  had  come  not  alone, 
but  bringing  with  them  a  local  tail  to  press  their  claims, 
and  the  distracted  victim  of  their  importunities  may 
very  likely  have  found  relief  in  turning  aside  for  a  few 
minutes  to  talk  to  a  visitor  about  Canadian  weather. 
A  terribly  seamy  side  of  American  democracy  is  the 
place-hunting.  We  all  know  how  Lincoln  at  the  su- 
preme moment  of  national  peril  was  distracted  by  the 
ravenous  importunities  of  the  place-hunters.  "Ah! 
It's  not  the  Civil  War,  it's  that  Postmastership  at  Ped- 
lington,"  he  cried  in  his  anguish.  For  ever  blessed  is 
the  memory  of  George  William  Curtis,  the  principal 
begetter  of  civil  service  reform!  It  is,  however,  not 
wonderful  that  civil  service  reform  should  have  a  hard 
life,  as  it  evidently  has,  under  the  party  system  of  Gov- 
ernment. Party  must  have  workers,  and  the  workers 
must  be  paid.  British  Ministers  were  willing  enough 
to  give  up  their  petty  patronage,  which  was  always  a 
great  plague  and  nuisance  to  them,  while  they  retained 
the  great  patronage  and  that  which  wins  the  support  of 


VISITS  TO  WASHINGTON  403 

powerful  men,  the  appointments  to  Peerages,  Baron- 
etcies, Knighthoods,  Bishoprics,  Deaneries,  Colonial 
Governorships,  Indian  Viceroyalty,  and  Irish  Lord 
Lieutenancy,  besides  the  social  grade  which  hitherto  at 
least  it  has  been  in  their  power  to  impart,  and  the  much- 
coveted  admission  to  Royal  Balls. 

I  was  at  Washington  when  the  Pension  Arrears  Bill 
was  going  through  Congress.  I  was  lunching  with  my 
old  acquaintance  Butler  and  a  party  of  Congressmen. 
I  ventured  to  ask  them  what  they  thought  would  be 
the  cost.  I  think  they  said  twenty-five  millions  of 
dollars  with  a  prospect  of  a  speedy  decrease.  Admira- 
tion filled  the  world  when,  after  the  war,  the  army, 
instead  of  overturning  the  Constitution  and  making  its 
General  a  dictator,  as  it  had  turned  its  ploughshares 
into  swords,  turned  back  the  swords  into  ploughshares 
and  returned  generally  to  the  employments  of  peaceful 
life.  Nobody  could  foresee  that  out  of  the  grave  of 
the  military  organization  would  arise  a  political  organ- 
ization styling  itself  the  Grand  Army  of  the  Republic 
and  plundering  the  nation  on  a  gigantic  scale.  Thirty- 
five  years  after  the  end  of  the  war,  the  country  was 
paying  one  hundred  and  forty  .millions  in  pensions,  of 
the  claims  for  which  a  large  proportion  were  notorious 
frauds.  Compared  with  this,  what  are  the  worst  cases 
of  monarchical  wastefulness?  What  was  the  cost 
of  that  paragon  of  monarchical  wastefulness,  Ver- 
sailles? Nor  was  the  expense  the  worst  of  the  evil. 
The  worst  of  the  evil  was  the  demoralization.  Yet  not 


404  REMINISCENCES 

a  politician  dared  say  a  word,  while  the  platforms  of  both 
parties  paid  a  cowardly  homage  to  the  Grand  Army 
vote  and  promised  a  liberal  construction  of  the  Pension 
Law,  that  is  to  say,  increased  license  of  public  pillage. 
There  are  few  things  more  shameful  in  the  annals  of  any 
nation.  The  total  cost  of  the  war  of  Secession,  when  to 
the  enormous  outlay  on  the  war  itself,  including  bonuses 
and  payments  to  substitutes,  is  added  the  pension, 
beggars  experience  and  almost  defies  calculation.  Per- 
haps, as  I  said  before,  for  a  Democracy  inclined  to 
Jingoism  the  cost  of  war  may  be  a  wholesome  correc- 
tive. Still,  the  waste  is  appalling. 

Of  course  I  frequented  the  galleries  of  the  Capitol. 
In  the  Senate  you  can  hear  the  Debate,  which  is  some- 
times worth  hearing.  In  the  House,  so  bad  are  the 
acoustics,  so  incessant  is  the  noise  of  talking,  moving 
about,  slamming  of  desks,  and  calling  of  pages,  that 
hardly  any  speaker  can  be  heard.  It  is  a  babel  with  a 
gavel  accompaniment.  Order  there  is  none.  I  have 
seen  a  number  of  Members  leave  their  places  and 
group  themselves,  standing,  round  a  speaker  whom 
they  particularly  wished  to  hear.  Mr.  Reed's  1  sten- 
torian voice  prevailed  over  the  din.  So  did  that  of 
Mr.  Bryan.2  It  may  almost  be  said  that  a  voice  of 
thunder  is  a  condition  of  political  eminence.  No 
ordinary  organ  will  fill  the  House  of  Representatives 

P  Thomas  Brackett  Reed  was  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives from  1889  to  1891.] 

[2  William  Jennings  Bryan,  Member  of  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives from  1891  to  1895  ;  Democratic  candidate  for  the  Presidency  in 
1896  and  other  dates.] 


VISITS  TO  WASHINGTON  405 

or  the  Hall  of  a  Convention.  Political  influence  thus 
comes  to  be  measured  by  power  of  lungs.  An  Ameri- 
can to  whom  I  made  this  remark  answered  that  it  was 
the  shrill  not  the  loud  voice  that  was  best  heard.  That 
may  be ;  still  the  power  of  sound,  whether  the  sound  is 
that  of  the  drum  or  of  the  fife,  predominates  over  that 
of  sense. 

The  average  of  speaking,  however,  in  America,  both 
in  Congress  and  elsewhere,  is  far  higher  than  it  is  in 
England.  Rhetoric  and  elocution  are  parts  of  American 
education.  Nor  is  American  oratory  in  general  any 
longer  vitiated  by  spread-eagle.  In  this,  as  in  others, 
Americans  have  found  out  their  weak  point.  You 
must  now  go  very  far  west,  or  perhaps  south,  to  meet 
with  an  Elijah  Pogram.1  The  training,  however,  has 
one  bad  result,  the  orator  seldom  gets  rid  of  the  air 
of  speaking  for  effect.  The  great  English  orators, 
nature's  elect  and  pupils,  such  as  Gladstone  and  Bright, 
speak  in  the  accents  of  nature  and  to  the  heart,  though 
practice  in  debating  societies  had  marred  the  freshness 
of  Gladstone's  style.  I  once  heard  Everett,  whose 
platform  oratory  was  the  acme  of  American  art.  His 
language  was  unimpeachable.  But  his  every  word 
and  not  only  his  every  word,  but  his  every  gesture,  was 
unmistakably  prepared.  He  seemed  to  gesticulate 
not  only  with  his  hands,  but  with  his  legs.  He  even 
planned  scenic  effects  beforehand.  Having  to  deliver 
a  Fourth  of  July  oration,  he  introduced  a  veteran  of 

I1  In  Dickens's  "  Martin  Chuzzlewit."] 


406  REMINISCENCES 

1812,  put  him  in  a  conspicuous  place,  and  told  the  old 
man  to  rise  to  him  at  his  entrance  into  the  Hall.  The 
old  man  did  as  he  had  been  bidden.  Everett  apos- 
trophized him  with,  "Venerable  old  man,  sit  down ! 
It  is  not  for  you  to  rise  to  us,  but  for  us  to  rise  to  you." 
The  veteran  said  afterwards,  "Mr.  Everett  is  a  strange 
man;  he  told  me  to  rise  when  he  came  into  the  Hall, 
and  when  I  did  rise  he  told  me  to  sit  down." 

I  have  always  had  a  poor  opinion  of  American  states- 
manship. In  the  United  States  the  grocers  are  states- 
men ;  the  statesmen  are  grocers.  The  level  of  political 
intelligence  among  the  people  is  probably  higher  than 
it  is  in  any  other  country.  The  aims  of  the  statesmen 
are  for  the  most  part  miserably  low  and  narrow.  Their 
treatment  of  the  Canadian  question,  among  other 
things,  is  a  proof  of  this.  Their  attention  and  energies 
have  been  greatly  absorbed  by  a  struggle  among  a  set 
of  corrupt  interests  for  the  bedevilment  of  the  Tariff. 
The  interests  being  largely  local,  politics  become  pa- 
rochial as  well  as  low.  The  term  of  the  Member  of  the 
House  of  Representatives  is  too  short  for  political  train- 
ing, and  that  House  is  a  chaos  led,  if  at  all,  most  incon- 
gruously by  the  Speaker,  who  acts  as  the  head  of  a 
party  when  he  ought  to  be  perfectly  impartial.  The 
exclusion  of  the  Ministers  of  State  from  the  Legislature 
deprives  legislation  of  guidance  and  divests  the  Minis- 
ters of  responsibility.  The  Ministers  are  creatures 
of  a  day,  going  out  of  office  with  the  President,  and 
seldom  afterwards  remaining  in  public  life,  so  that 


VISITS  TO  WASHINGTON  407 

there  can  be  no  continuity  of  policy  in  the  Department 
of  Foreign  Affairs  or  elsewhere.  The  Senate  being 
comparatively  permanent,  as  well  as  composed  of  a 
rather  more  powerful  class  of  men  than  the  House, 
power  gravitates  to  it,  and  it  seems  likely  to  become 
paramount,  while  it  is  itself  becoming  a  representation 
of  log-rolling  monopolies.  Men  whose  private  business 
is  important  are  giving  up  their  places  in  the  House  of 
Representatives,  feeling  that  their  time  spent  there  is 
wasted.  The  weak  points  of  the  American  Constitu- 
tion are  beginning  to  appear.  Deference  to  the  false 
diagnosis  of  Montesquieu  entered  into  its  construction 
and  is  now  interfering  with  its  working  as  a  republican 
counterpart  of  the  Constitution  of  Great  Britain. 

Such  faith  as  I  have  in  the  political  future  of  the 
American  people  was  formed  by  those  two  years' 
residence  in  a  little  American  town.  Ithaca,  if  a  fair 
appeal  could  be  made  to  its  good  sense,  would  settle 
aright  questions  in  the  treatment  of  which  Washington, 
under  the  influence  of  sinister  intents  and  slavery  to 
party  fails. 

The  tendency  of  society  at  Washington,  of  Official 
and  Congressional  society  particularly,  to  dress  itself 
after  European  Courts  and  to  mimic  their  etiquette  is 
manifest  and  amusing.  Still,  when  I  was  there,  Demo- 
cracy continued  to  assert  itself,  especially  in  the  famil- 
iarity of  the  people  with  the  head  of  the  Republic.  I 
attended  one  of  the  Presidential  receptions  at  the 
White  House.  It  was  in  the  evening.  There  was  an 


408  REMINISCENCES 

immense  attendance  of  people  all  in  their  common  dress. 
From  the  time  when  I  fell  into  the  line  it  took  three 
quarters  of  an  hour  to  reach  the  White  House.  It 
took  the  same  time  to  get  from  the  entrance  to  the 
White  House  to  the  Reception  Room,  where  the  name 
of  each  visitor  was  called  by  the  Marshal,  and  the  Presi- 
dent took  each  in  turn  by  the  hand.  Sad  the  plight 
of  his  hand  at  last  must  have  been.  Nothing,  however, 
could  be  better  than  the  behaviour  of  the  people- 
They  moved  on  quietly  in  line,  showing  not  the  slight- 
est sign  of  impatience.  It  is  doubtful  whether  a  crowd 
of  the  aristocratic  society  at  London  would  have  be- 
haved quite  as  well.  We  used  to  hear  of  scuffles  and 
of  torn  dresses  in  the  ' Crush  Room'  at  St.  James's. 

I  was  at  Washington  in  1885  when,  in  consequence 
of  the  Penjdeh  incident,1  Great  Britain  was  on  the 
brink  of  a  war  with  Russia.  Authentic  information 
came  to  me  concerning  a  new  military  invention  which 
had  been  tried  in  presence  of  the  Russian  Ambassador 
with  success  and  seemed  to  be  important.  I  at  once 
wrote  to  the  Governor-General  of  Canada  2  offering, 
if  it  was  deemed  worth  while  to  inquire,  to  bear  any 
necessary  expense.  I  communicated  also  with  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Government  in  England  who  certainly  gave 
serious  attention  to  the  matter.  I  may  mention  this, 
as  this  page  will  meet  no  eye  but  my  own  while  I  live. 
I  have  not  been  regardless  of  my  British  Citizenship, 

t1  An  attack,  in  March,  1885,  by  the  Russian  General  Komaroff 
on  a  fortified  Afghan  post.]  [2  Lord  Lansdowne.] 


VISITS  TO  WASHINGTON  409 

though,  living  long  away  from  my  own  country  in  a 
country  not  my  own,  I  have  naturally  become  more 
or  less  a  citizen  of  the  world.  In  Canada  I  was  the 
President  of  the  Loyal  and  Patriotic  Union  formed 
at  the  time  of  Mr.  William  O'Brien's  incursion,1  to  up- 
hold the  integrity  of  the  United  Kingdom,  while  the 
Dominion  Parliament  and  the  Ontario  Legislature, 
with  all  their  loyalty,  had  been  courting  the  Irish  vote 
by  resolutions  in  favour  of  Home  Rule,  as  the  Dominion 
Parliament  has  again  done.  When  Summer  traduced 
England,  I,  being  then  in  the  United  States,  answered 
him,2  and  I  hope  I  have  never  failed  in  dealing  with 

t1  1886.] 

P  Through  the  kindness  of  Mr.  R.  C.  Edlund,  of  Cornell  Univer- 
sity, Ithaca,  I  learn  that :  — 

"In  Volume  XIII  of  the  Works  of  Charles  Sumner,  published  by 
Lee  and  Shepard,  Boston,  1880,  on  pages  53  to  93,  there  is  an  address 
entitled  'Claims  on  England,  —  Individual  and  National,'  with  the 
sub-title  'Speech  on  the  Johnson-Clarendon  Treaty,  in  Executive 
Session  of  the  Senate,  April  13,  1869.'  Although  this  speech  was 
made  in  Executive  Session,  it  appears  that  the  Senate  removed  the 
injunction  of  secrecy  that  is  usually  placed  on  speeches  so  made 
and  reports  of  it  were  extensively  printed  and  circulated." 

To  this  Goldwin  Smith  replied  in  a  speech  at  Ithaca  on  the  19th 
of  May,  1869,  on  "The  Relations  between  America  and  England." 
This  speech  was  afterwards  printed  in  pamphlet  form  by  "G.  C. 
Bragdon,  Publisher,  Ithaca,  N.Y.,  The  Ithacan  Office."  In  a 
Preface  to  this  are  the  following  paragraphs  :  — 

"The  Chairman  of  the  Senate  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations 
seemed  to  speak  the  mind  of  the  Senate  and  the  nation;  and  had 
his  speech  been  followed  by  action  in  the  shape  of  a  pressure  of  his 
demands,  as  the  answer  of  Great  Britain  could  not  be  doubtful, 
the  danger  of  a  rupture  of  friendly  relations  between  the  two  coun- 
tries would  have  been  serious. 

"An  Englishman  resident  in  America  may  be  an  imperfect  judge 
of  the  indications  of  American  feeling ;  but  he  has  the  advantage  of 


410  REMINISCENCES 

history  to  plead  the  cause  of  my  country  where  I  be- 
lieved she  was  in  the  right.  I  could  never  have  said 
with  Decatur,  "My  country,  right  or  wrong." 

A  curious  structure  is  the  party  system  of  the  United 
States.  There  are  two  great  organizations  always  on 
foot  and  now  recognized  by  constitutional  law,  which, 
for  example,  provides  that  the  two  parties  shall  be 
equally  recognized  in  the  appointments  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission.  But  the  principles  of  each  organ- 
ization are  ambulatory,  and  a  fresh  platform  is  con- 
structed before  each  Presidential  election,  the  planks 
being  selected  with  a  view  to  the  attraction  of  votes. 
It  is  possible  to  trace  a  connection,  though  of  a  very 
tortuous  kind,  in  the  principles  of  the  Democratic 
party,  which  having  in  the  time  of  Jefferson  been, 
though  under  a  different  name,  ultra-Democratic, 
became  that  of  the  slave-owning  Oligarchy  of  the  South, 
the  medium  of  transformation  being  the  ultra-Demo- 
cratic theory  of  State-right,  which  sheltered  slavery. 
The  changes,  nevertheless,  are  vital.  Nobody  would 
recognize  the  identity  of  the  plutocratic  Republican 
of  the  present  day  with  the  patriotic  Republican  of 
the  struggle  for  the  Union.  A  journal  which  was  for- 
merly the  Democratic  organ  of  the  slave-owning  interest 
is  now  the  Republican  organ  of  the  plutocracy  without 
feeling  the  change. 

knowing  something  of  both  sides :  and  the  danger  was  to  be  meas- 
ured, not  by  the  feelings  or  intentions  of  the  American  people  alone, 
but  by  these  combined  with  the  general  temper  and  present  mood  of 
the  powerful  nation  against  which  Mr.  Sumner's  speech  was  made."] 


VISITS   TO   WASHINGTON  411 

I  was  at  Washington  at  the  time  of  the  Half-Breed 
rising  in  the  Canadian  North- West.1  There  was  afloat 
in  the  United  States  a  belief  that  not  only  the  Half- 
Breeds  but  the  Indians  in  Canada  had  been  oppressed 
and  goaded  to  rebellion.  I  was  accosted  by  a  reporter, 
a  young  man  of  gentlemanly  manner  who  introduced 
himself  as  a  graduate  of  a  first-class  University,  and 
desired  that  I  would  allow  him  to  interview  me  on  the 
North- West  question.  I  thought  there  would  be  no 
harm  or  danger  in  telling  him  that  the  case  of  the  Half- 
Breeds  was  under  investigation,  but  that  to  the  Indians 
the  conduct  of  the  Canadian  Government  had  cer- 
tainly been  just  and  kind.  Next  morning,  taking  up 
his  paper,  I  found  that  I  was  made  not  only  to  say  the 
opposite  of  what  I  had  said  about  the  Half-Breeds  and 
Indians,  but  to  bring  forward  a  fresh  charge  of  mal- 
treatment of  settlers  against  the  Canadian  Govern- 
ment, and  to  quote  a  letter  in  support  of  it;  I  never 
having  heard  either  of  the  charge  or  of  the  letter. 
After  a  Presidential  election  it  was  wired  from  New 
York  to  Canada  that  I  had  declared  my  intention  of 
calling  upon  the  President-elect  and  urging  the  imme- 
diate annexation  of  Canada  to  the  United  States.  I 
had  not  been  in  New  York  for  weeks,  and  it  is  needless 
to  say  that  I  never  thought  of  being  guilty  of  such  an 
impropriety  as  approaching  a  President  of  the  United 
States  on  any  subject  whatever.  The  British  Associa- 

[l  1884-1885.  —  This  was  the  rebellion  that  was  led  by  Louis 
Kiel  and  quelled  by  General  Middleton.] 


412  REMINISCENCES 

tion,  when  it  first  visited  Canada,  brought  with  it  a 
number  of  trippers  whose  behaviour  was  not  entirely 
worthy  of  science.  Some  of  these  men  went  to  Phila- 
delphia, where  there  was  an  exposition  going  on,  and 
there  also  got  into  an  altercation  with  the  natives. 
The  consequence  was  that,  taking  up  an  American 
journal,  I  read  that  I  had  written  a  letter  to  a  Toronto 
paper  denouncing  these  people  for  their  behaviour  and 
branding  them  as  bagmen.  I  at  once  sent  in  a  correc- 
tion, saying  that  I  had  not  written  or  thought  of  writ- 
ing any  letter  of  the  kind,  and  that  when  the  British 
Association  was  in  Canada  I  was  attending  a  Convention 
at  Chicago.  After  a  long  delay,  the  correction  ap- 
peared. I  sent  a  disclaimer  to  Tyndall,  who  in  his  reply 
said  that  a  thing  of  the  same  kind  had  happened  to  him 
in  New  York.  He  had  been  made  to  pass  a  severe 
stricture  on  the  fire  service,  when  he  had  never  said  a 
word  upon  the  subject.  I  heard  of  a  case  in  which, 
complaint  having  been  made  of  a  totally  fictitious  ac- 
count of  an  affair  of  which  a  reporter  had  written  in 
absolute  ignorance,  the  editor's  answer  was  that  the 
reporter  had  done  his  best  under  trying  circumstances. 
Let  me  say  for  my  old  friend  Mr.  Charles  Dana,1  of 
the  New  York  Sun,  that  whatever  might  be  his  faults, 
prone  as  he  certainly  was  to  extreme  prejudices  and  a 
violent  expression  of  them,  he  had  the  feelings  of  a 
gentleman  with  regard  to  the  social  honour  of  the  press. 

P  Charles  Anderson  Dana  became  editor  of  the  New  York  Sun 
in  1868.     Born  at  Hinsdale,  N.H.,  in  1819.] 


VISITS  TO  WASHINGTON  413 

I  had  occasion  once  to  appeal  to  him  on  this  score,  and 
he  responded  most  promptly  and  heartily  to  the  appeal. 
If  anybody  had  brought  Charles  Dana  a  report  of  what 
had  been  said  at  a  private  dinner-table,  I  think  Dana 
would  have  kicked  him  downstairs.  The  Press  surely 
ought  to  have,  and  to  enforce  by  common  action,  its 
professional  rules  of  honour. 

It  is  needless  for  me  to  add  to  the  flowers  of  praise 
deservedly  strewn  on  the  tomb  of  my  friend  E.  L.  God- 
kin.1  In  days  in  which  the  question  what  is  behind  the 
press  was  of  all  questions  not  the  least  dark  or  the  least 
formidable,  we  always  knew  that  strict  integrity  and 
perfect  independence  were  behind  the  Nation.  Master 
of  a  most  telling  style,  and  using  it  fearlessly  in  the 
cause  of  what  he  deemed,  and  was  very  seldom  mistaken 
in  deeming,  right,  he  was  one  of  the  very  best  antiseptic 
elements  in  American  public  life.  He  of  course  received 
from  all  wrong-doers  an  abundant  tribute  of  hatred 
and  abuse.  There  never  was  a  more  genuine  patriot. 
Party,  popular  passion,  and  advertisers,  all  of  these  he 
could  defy  in  the  interest  of  the  country.  He  has  left 
few  behind  him  who  can  do  the  same. 

[l  Edwin  Lawrence  Godkin  was  born  in  Ireland  in  1831 ;  became 
editor  and  proprietor  of  the  New  York  Nation  in  1856,  and  of  the 
New  York  Evening  Post  in  1881.] 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

VISITS  TO   THE   NORTH-WEST 

1870,  1888,  1889 

The  North- West  —  Winnipeg  —  Skye  Crofters  —  Immigration  — 
Annexation — The  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  —  The  Rocky 
Mountains  —  British  Columbia. 

I  PAID  two  visits  l  to  that  land  of  miraculous  promise, 
the  North- West.  Very  impressive  was  the  view  of 
that  unbounded  plain,  its  expanse  stretching  out  like 
a  sea  purpled  by  the  twilight  and  set  off  by  an  electric 
light  upon  some  tower  in  the  distance.  Very  lovely 
no  doubt  is  the  prairie  in  the  season  of  flowers.  But 
it  must  be  trying  to  the  spirits  to  live  in  a  country 
without  a  hill  or  a  tree,  especially  on  a  lonely  farm. 
Fortunately  the  pioneer  is  not  afflicted  with  morbid 
sensibilities.  The  fruitfulness  of  the  soil  is  extraordi- 
nary, and  apparently  it  is  inexhaustible.  I  found  no 
falling  off  in  the  vegetables  of  a  garden  which  had  been 
worked  for  thirty  years.  But  the  fertility  of  the  soil 
is  balanced  by  the  severity  of  the  climate.  In  harvest 
time  everybody  is  trembling  for  fear  of  an  early  frost. 

f1  In  1870  he  went  to  Winnipeg ;  in  1880  to  the  Pacific  coast. 
A  third  journey  was  made  in  1889,  but  to  what  point,  I  do  not 
know.] 

414 


VISITS  TO  THE  NORTH-WEST  415 

The  intensity  of  the  cold  is  no  doubt  mitigated  by  the 
dryness  of  the  air.  But  it  is  in  vain  that  the  people 
conspire  as  they  do  to  make  you  believe  that  forty 
below  zero  is  pleasant.  The  inconvenience,  if  not  the 
suffering,  must  be  great.  You  will  not  persuade  me 
that  you  are  in  bliss  when  your  breath  freezes  on  your 
sheets,  or  when,  after  keeping  several  stoves  burning  in 
your  house  all  night,  your  bread  is  frozen  till  twelve 
o'clock  next  day.  Most  of  the  settlers  are  young,  and 
their  blood  is  warm. 

I  had  been  curious  to  see  the  North- West,  partly 
because  I  thought  that  farm-life  there  would  be  likely 
to  change  its  character.  The  prairie  is  specially 
adapted  to  machine  farming.  It  seemed  probable  that 
large  farms  would  pay,  while  in  the  long  winter  and  the 
great  solitudes  there  would  be  social  cheerfulness  in 
the  staff.  The  system  was  tried,  and  at  the  Bell  farm, 
where  I  was  most  kindly  received,  I  saw  1400  acres 
of  wheat  in  a  single  field.  But  the  experiment  failed, 
principally,  I  believe,  owing  to  the  cost  of  keeping  the 
staff  during  the  winter. 

Young  Englishmen  of  the  upper  class  seemed  as  a 
rule  to  fail  as  farmers  in  the  North- West,  though  they 
did  better  in  the  ranches.  It  was  said  that  their  har- 
vests were  remittances.  Many  of  them  had  drifted 
into  the  Mounted  Police;  many  of  them  afterwards 
drifted  into  the  [South  African]  Contingent.  A  farmer 
in  Canada  must  work  hard,  live  hard,  and  bargain 
hard.  A  young  English  gentleman  may  do  the  first  at 


416  REMINISCENCES 

a  pinch;  the  second  he  does  less  easily;  the  third  he 
cannot  do  at  all. 

When  I  first  saw  Winnipeg  it  was  in  its  pioneer  phase, 
and  at  the  same  time  in  its  fit  of  sickness  after  the 
"boom."  In  the  boom  of  course  sharks  had  thriven. 
One  of  them  played  a  cunning  trick  to  pass  off  a  lot 
upon  a  greenhorn  for  many  times  its  value.  The  green- 
horn at  first  was  shy  and  went  away.  But  he  was 
followed  by  a  confederate  who  contrived  to  speak, 
not  to  him,  but  in  his  hearing,  of  the  immense  value 
of  the  lot,  pretending  that  he  was  himself  trying  to 
raise  the  money  to  buy  it.  The  dupe  slipped  away 
in  a  hurry  and  closed  the  bargain.  Speculation  with- 
out capital  is  a  walk  of  industry  which  many  take  in 
booms  and  which  leads  to  ruin  and  disgrace.  On  the 
other  hand,  there  was  not  the  slightest  symptom  of 
anything  rowdy  or  lawless. 

I  attended  the  opening  of  the  new-born  Legislature 
at  Winnipeg.  The  approach  of  the  Lieutenant-Gov- 
ernor1  was  announced  by  a  series  of  explosions  intended 
to  represent  the  firing  of  cannon,  but  made,  I  under- 
stood, by  the  letting  off  of  gunpowder  with  a  hot  poker. 
There  being  one  or  two  French  Members,  I  am  not  sure 
which,  the  Lieutenant-Governor  read  his  speech  from 
the  throne  in  French  as  well  as  in  English.  I  suspect  the 

I1  The  Hon.  Adams  George  Archibald,  of  Nova  Scotia.  —  The  pro- 
clamation for  the  admission  of  the  new  Province  of  Manitoba  into 
the  Dominion  of  Canada  was  issued  on  the  23d  of  June,  1870  ;  Mr. 
Archibald  arrived  at  Winnepeg  and  assumed  the  functions  of  Lieu- 
tenant-Governor on  September  the  3d  of  the  same  year.] 


VISITS  TO  THE  NORTH-WEST  417 

effect  upon  the  French  ears  was  like  that  of  the  Irish 
Major's  address  upon  Prince  Napoleon,  who  in  reply 
deplored  his  ignorance  of  "la  belle  langue  Irelandaise." 

As  an  offset  to  the  French  of  the  Irish  Major,  I  may 
say  that  the  Prince  de  Canino l  at  a  dinner  of  the  British 
Association,  having  to  propose  the  toast  of  '  Science/ 
said,  "I  shall  give  you  one  to-ast :  May  de  tree  of  science 
flourish  for  ever  and  shower  down  peas  upon  the 
nations." 

I  visited  the  settlement  of  Skye  Crofters.  Evidently 
it  was  a  miserable  failure.  The  home  of  these  people 
had  been  in  a  climate  mild  though  moist,  and  they 
had  not  been  farmers  but  herdsmen,  boatmen,  fisher- 
men, tilling  a  plot  of  oats  or  potatoes  with  the  spade. 
Probably  they  had  never  handled  a  plough;  a  binder 
they  had  never  seen.  A  benevolent  lady  had  sent 
them  out,  as  she  fondly  thought,  to  the  happy  land. 
The  Icelanders,  by  all  accounts,  did  well.  The  Men- 
nonites,  as  farmers,  better  still ;  but  in  their  habits  of 
living  they  were  rather  troglodytic,  and  since  they 
have  got  the  franchise  their  votes  are  said  to  come  to 
market  in  the  lump.  As  I  write  2  settlers  from  the 
United  States  are  pouring  into  the  North- Western 
Territories,  which  they  were  sure  to  do  when  in  Minne- 
sota and  Dakota  land  became  dear.  The  North- West 
will  be  American. 

f1  Louis  Lucien  Bonaparte,  the  fourth  son  of  Lucien  Bonaparte, 
Prince  of  Canino.  A  French  philologist.  After  1870  he  lived 
chiefly  in  England.  Born  1813 ;  died  1891.] 

[2  This  was  written  in  1903.] 

2E 


418  REMINISCENCES 

Fear  of  the  vast  influx  of  an  alien  population  is 
expressed.  Fear  of  a  vast  alien  population  will  speed- 
ily subside  when  it  is  proved  that  the  inflowing  popula- 
tion is  not  alien,  but  is  identical,  to  say  the  least, 
with  the  Canadian,  as  the  population  of  Scotland  has 
proved  to  be  with  that  of  England.  " Annexation," 
so  much  dreaded  and  denounced,  what  is  it,  I  ask 
once  more,  but  the  reunion  of  two  great  sections  of  the 
English-speaking  race  ? 

In  the  grounds  of  the  Winnipeg  Penitentiary  were 
to  be  seen  some  of  the  few  survivors  of  the  mighty 
race  of  buffalo,  the  sudden  disappearance  of  which 
seems  to  be  one  of  the  most  curious  things  in  natural 
history.  About  fifteen  years  before,  Mr.  Cornell  had 
invited  me  to  go  with  him  on  a  tour  through  the  West, 
which  I  was  prevented  from  doing;  and  when  he 
returned  he  said  he  was  sorry  I  had  not  been  with  him, 
for  he  had  seen  ten  square  miles  of  buffalo.  Suddenly 
the  race  became  extinct,  and  the  true  reason  of  its 
extinction  I  failed  to  learn.  It  could  hardly  have  been 
all  shot  in  so  short  a  time.  Railroads  or  a  new  obstacle 
of  some  kind  must  have  interfered  with  its  necessary 
migrations.  Its  surviving  representatives  at  Winnipeg 
were  huge  antediluvian  monsters.  One  of  them  came 
up  to  my  buggy  and  looked  at  it  so  seriously  that  the 
occupant  thought  it  best  to  move  on. 

From  Winnipeg  to  Calgary  by  the  Canadian  Pacific 
Railway  was  in  those  days  a  weary  journey,  the  dul- 
ness  of  the  lonely  expanse  being  broken  only  by  the 


VISITS  TO   THE  NORTH-WEST  419 

little  gophers,  which  then  perked  up  as  the  train  passed, 
but  by  this  time  have  probably  shared  the  general  fate 
of  aborigines.  At  long  intervals  was  seen  a  settler's 
cottage,  planted  in  conformity  with  the  strange  and 
rather  cruel  regulation  of  the  Company  half  a  mile 
off  the  Railroad.  To  the  constructors  of  the  Canadian 
Pacific  Railway  the  praise  of  enterprise  and  energy  is 
due.  To  Canada  the  benefit  has  been  questionable. 
The  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  was  not  a  good  coloniza- 
tion road.  The  greater  part  of  the  emigrants  it  carried 
over  to  the  Pacific  State.  The  rest  were  scattered 
along  a  line  of  eight  hundred  miles  instead  of  settling 
close,  as  would  plainly  have  been  best  for  them,  espe- 
cially in  such  a  country.  Had  the  North- West  been 
left  to  itself,  it  would  in  due  time,  like  the  Western 
States,  have  provided  itself  with  railroads  according 
to  the  measure  of  its  needs,  and  probably  on  a  better 
plan,  without  the  enormous  cost  to  the  country,  with- 
out, it  may  be  added,  the  political  danger  which  the 
influence  of  this  enormous  corporation  has  entailed. 
Too  truly  the  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  has  been  called 
"the  Dominion  Government  on  wheels."  When  we 
had  a  chance  of  obtaining  reciprocity  with  the  United 
States,  the  manager,  Van  Home,  himself  an  American,1 
put  forth  a  hostile  manifesto,  though  his  line  was 
beholden  to  the  United  States  for  its  bonding  privilege. 

P  Sir  William  Cornelius  Van  Home,  K.C.M.G.,  now  Chairman 
of  the  Board  of  Directors  of  the  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  Com- 
pany.] 


420  REMINISCENCES 

It  was  not  fair  to  judge  the  Rockies  by  a  mere  pas- 
sage through  them  on  the  Canadian  Pacific  Railway. 
But  to  me  they  were  a  disappointment.  They  are 
surely  not  comparable  to  the  Alps.  They  present 
nothing,  at  least  they  presented  to  me  nothing,  like  the 
panoramic  view  from  Basle  when  the  evening  light  is 
on  the  snow  peaks.  Besides,  they  lack,  what  Switzer- 
land and  Tyrol  have  in  their  old  towns  and  castles, 
the  piquant  conjunction  of  human  interest  with  the 
lonely  grandeurs  of  nature.  My  opinion  was  little 
changed  by  a  week  at  Banff,  and  a  visit  to  the  Devil's 
Lake  with  its  mighty  bastions  of  rock,  their  feet  clad 
with  the  monotonous  pine.  The  boatman  who  rowed 
us  on  the  lake  was,  I  felt  sure,  from  his  look  and  speech 
and  the  manner  in  which  he  took  the  fare,  a  young  Eng- 
lish gentleman  broken  down. 

The  coast  scenery  of  British  Columbia  impressed 
me  more  than  the  Rockies.  It  is  very  peculiar  as  well 
as  very  fine.  The  vegetation  is  tropical  in  luxuriance, 
though  not  in  variety,  and  the  pines  and  cedars  are 
gigantic.  I  never  saw  anything  so  grand  in  the  way 
of  trees  as  the  cathedral-like  colonnade  of  mighty  pines 
and  cedars  between  Vancouver  and  New  Westminster, 
unless  it  were  the  grove  of  spruces  at  Welbeck,  the 
Duke  of  Portland's  place  in  England. 

Victoria,  with  its  pretty  cottages  amidst  their  bowers 
of  roses,  is  a  charming  little  place.  It  seemed  free  from 
the  racket  of  commerce,  resting  on  the  little  fortunes 
made  from  the  gold-washings  of  former  ages.  The 


VISITS,  TO  THE  NORTH-WEST  421 

general  air  was  repose.  A  bustling  activity  seemed  to 
reign  in  the  Chinese  quarter  alone.  The  view  of  the 
American  snow-range  opposite  is  very  fine,  but  one 
wishes  the  name  were  not  " Olympian."  Perhaps, 
however,  even  false  classicism  is  better  than  naming 
mountains  after  directors  of  railway  companies.  Why 
not  follow  the  example  of  Switzerland  with  her  Wetter- 
horn  and  Jungfrau? 

Desperate  efforts  are  made  to  keep  out  the  Chinese. 
The  pretexts  are  social  and  moral,  sometimes  religious. 
The  real  motive,  of  course,  is  fear  of  their  competition 
in  the  labour  market.  They  will  probably  force  their 
way  in  the  end.  In  the  meantime  there  is  exhibited 
the  curious  spectacle  of  wars  made  on  China  for  her 
inhospitality  to  foreigners,  while  these  foreigners 
themselves  practise  the  height  of  inhospitality  to  the 
Chinese. 

The  Canadian  Pacific  Railway  was  built,  and  the 
Dominion  was  stretched  out  to  the  Pacific,  making  it, 
as  Mr.  Dunkin  said,  like  seven  fishing-rods  tied  together 
by  the  ends,  and  depriving  it  of  the  last  vestige  of  terri- 
torial and  economical  unity,  for  the  purpose  of  incor- 
porating British  Columbia,  which  threatened,  if  the 
road  was  not  built,  to  stand  aloof  from  Confederation. 
Having  been  incorporated  at  all  this  expense  and  risk, 
British  Columbia  might  almost  as  well  be  in  another 
planet.  Some  Canadians  speculate  in  its  mines;  but 
nobody  knows  or  cares  anything  about  its  politics  or 
its  general  concerns.  Its  politics,  if  they  were  known, 


422  REMINISCENCES 

would  not  edify;  when  I  asked  what  they  were,  the 
answer  was,  " Government  appropriations."  While  I 
am  writing  this  there  is  a  turmoil  of  political  discord 
and  intrigue  going  on  in  the  Pacific  Province,  of  which 
it  may  safely  be  said  the  man  in  the  street  of  Toronto 
could  give  no  account  whatever.1 

The  English  look  of  Victoria  was  attractive,  and  I 
was  thinking  of  spending  some  days  there  and  hoping 
to  make  some  acquaintances.  The  Society,  I  knew, 
was  Tory,  but  I  thought  I  might  have  left  my  Radical 
reputation  behind.  But  on  looking  into  the  leading 
journal  of  the  place  I  lighted  on  an  editorial  which  led 
me,  having  seen  the  beauties  of  the  place,  to  return  by 
the  evening  boat  to  Vancouver. 

Vancouver  was  evidently  flourishing  as  a  port,  but 
I  cannot  help  thinking  it  unlikely  that  the  grand  line 
of  the  world's  commerce  and  transportation  will  be 
through  the  sub-arctic  region. 

British  Columbia  has  beauty,  wealth,  much  that  has 
been  attracted  to  it  already,  while  much  more  must  be 
attracted  to  it  in  time.  But  the  grave  question  pre- 
sents itself:  Whose  will  British  Columbia  be?  Can 
American  and  British  Dreadnoughts,  even  supposing 

P  June,  1903.  —  There  was  a  dismissal  of  a  Liberal  Prime  Min- 
ister; an  attempt  to  form  a  sort  of  coalition  Government  by  the 
leader  of  the  Opposition ;  resignations  of  prominent  politicians ; 
a  dissolution;  a  "political  contest"  which  "gradually  grew  warmer 
and  warmer";  and  a  general  election.  —  See  "The  Canadian  An- 
nual Review  of  Public  Affairs,  1903."  By  J.  Castell  Hopkins,  F.S.S. 
Toronto :  Annual  Review  Publishing  Company.  1904.  Pages  214, 
et  seq.] 


VISITS  TO   THE  NORTH-WEST  423 

them  to  be  united,  hold  the  Pacific?  What  will  be 
the  limit  to  the  growth  of  the  military  power  of 
Japan?  Is  it  likely  that  there  will  be  a  junction  of 
Japan  with  China?  Will  Germany,  provoked  perhaps 
by  the  mischief-making  of  British  Protectionists,  throw 
herself  into  the  Japanese  and  Chinese  scale?  Will 
India  rise  in  alliance  with  Japan  and  China?  It  is 
hard  to  discern  the  future ;  specially  hard  if  the  greed 
of  commerce  persists  in  stimulating  the  passion  of  war. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

CANADIAN  POLITICS 

The  Relation  of  Canada  to  the  Imperial  Country  —  Confederation 
—  Quebec  —  Titles  for  Colonists  —  Political  Parties  —  Sir  John 
Macdonald — George  Brown — Alexander  Mackenzie — Edward 
Blake  —  John  Sandfield  Macdonald  —  Joseph  Howe  —  Francis 
Hincks  —  Sir  Richard  Cartwright  —  Sir  Charles  Tupper  —  The 
Destiny  of  the  Colonies — Annexation  —  "  Canada  First "  — The 
Irish  Question  —  Free  Trade  —  Reciprocity  —  The  Temperance 
Question  —  The  Patrons  of  Industry  —  The  Weekly  Sun. 

CANADA,  with  its  fine-drawn  relation  to  the  Imperial 
country  and  the  equivocal  junction  of  two  not  very 
friendly  races  in  itself,  forms  rather  a  special  study  for 
the  Imperialist  politician.  At  the  time  of  the  conquest 
by  Chatham  and  Wolfe,  all  in  England  was  boundless 
exultation.  The  object  in  conquering  Canada  was  to 
set  the  English  settlements  to  the  south  of  it  free  from 
fear  of  France.  Canada  having  been  conquered,  the 
English  colonists,  being  of  the  Republican  breed,  re- 
belled against  the  Mother-country  in  pursuance  of  a 
quarrel,  really  trifling,  which  might  have  been  easily 
patched  up.  Into  the  war  France  went  on  the  side  of 
the  United  States  to  avenge  her  own  wrong.  That 
war  was  the  ruin  of  French  finance,  compelled  the 
French  Government  to  summon  the  States  General, 

424 


GOLDWIN  SMITH  AT  SEVENTY-FIVE  YEARS  OF  AGE. 

Photograph  by  Dixon,  of  Toronto. 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  425 

and  brought  on  the  French  Revolution,  with  all  that 
followed.  The  train  of  consequences  may  be  traced  yet 
even  further.  In  England  the  abolition  of  negro  slavery, 
which  had  been  fast  coming,  was  put  off,  and  the  con- 
sequences of  its  postponement,  including  the  war  be- 
tween the  free  and  slave  States,  were  entailed. 

Since  the  settlement  of  the  constitution  under  Lord 
Elgin l  and  the  bonfire  in  the  form  of  the  burning  of  the 
Parliament.  House  at  Quebec,2  the  only  real  division 
that  remained  was  that  of  the  British  Provinces  from 
the  French  Province,  which  held  and  still  holds  to  its 
nationality  and  its  Catholicism,  though  Lord  Durham 
had  regarded  the  effacement  of  its  nationality  as  abso- 
lutely essential  to  the  completion  of  his  work. 

The  struggle  between  the  monarchical  and  the  popu- 
lar principle  of  Government  ended  with  the  rebellion  of 
1837.  Beaten  in  the  field,  the  party  of  popular  govern- 
ment, aided  by  the  same  party  in  the  Imperial  country, 
triumphed  in  the  political  arena.  The  spasm  of  re- 
action under  Lord  Metcalfe  3  was  the  end.  Thence- 
forth the  political  history  becomes  a  struggle  of  parties, 
splitting  sometimes  into  sections  without  distinct 
principles  or  general  objects,  for  power  and  place.  This 
ended  in  a  deadlock,  out  of  which  a  way  was  found  in  the 
Confederation  of  all  the  North  American  colonies,  with 

P  James  Bruce,  eighth  Earl  of  Elgin,  Governor-General  of  Can- 
ada from  1847  to  1854.] 

P  April  the  26th,  1849.] 

['  Charles  Theophilus,  first  Baron  Metcalfe,  Governor-General 
of  Canada  from  1843  till  1845.] 


426  REMINISCENCES 

a  federal  constitution.1  The  supposed  model  was  Great 
Britain.  But  nothing  in  the  debate  shows  that  the 
difference  of  circumstances  between  the  two  countries 
was  taken  into  account.  The  British  Kingdom  is  geo- 
graphically united;  it  is  divided  at  least  only  by  the 
narrow  Irish  Channel.  The  union  of  the  Canadian 
Provinces  resembles,  as  a  wit  said  in  the  debate,  not 
that  of  a  bundle  of  rods,  gaining  strength  by  their  union, 
to  which  a  confederationist  had  complacently  compared 
it,  but  that  of  seven  fishing-rods  tied  together  by  the 
ends.  Such  a  geographical  dispersion  seems  to  pre- 
clude identity  of  interest,  and  with  it  unanimity  in 
council;  though  about  this  we  shall  learn  more  when 
the  effects  of  Western  annexation  are  fully  felt.  There 
are  in  Canada  no  social  materials  for  a  House  of  Lords, 
nor  is  there  anything  like  that  independent  gentry  which 
has  furnished  the  conservative  element  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  The  leading  men  in  Canada  are  com- 
mercial, and  cannot  leave  their  business  offices  for 
Ottawa;  or  if  they  do,  it  is  on  business  of  their  own. 

Confederation,  when  settled  itself,  could  not  beget 
issues  of  principle.  The  contest  between  parties  again 
became  a  struggle  of  factions  for  power  and  place,  with 
the  rancour,  intrigue,  and  corruption  inseparable  from 
such  a  contest,  and  with  the  sort  of  statesmanship  that 
it  forms. 

What  is  the  destiny  of  Quebec  ?  Durham  took  it  for 
granted  that  Quebec  must  be  absorbed  in  British  Can- 
P  By  the  British  North  America  Act  of  1867 :  30  and  31  Viet.  c.  3.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  427 

ada.  Instead  of  being  absorbed,  Quebec  dominates  by 
the  help  of  venal  support  in  the  other  Provinces.  Her 
quasi  nationality  has  now  a  powerful  and  chivalrous 
champion  in  Bourassa.1  But  the  end  must  come.  The 
English  Provinces  and  the  United  States,  to  which  the 
workmen  of  Quebec  go,  will  have  their  influence.  The 
people  of  Quebec,  the  peasantry  especially,  are  pious 
and  devoted  to  the  priesthood,  who  have  hitherto  been 
their  leaders  and  masters.  But  Papalism  cannot  reign 
for  ever,  and  when  it  loses  its  hold,  Quebec's  nationality 
will  fall. 

In  these  movements  and  the  attendant  controversies 
I  supported  the  policy  which  I  believed  to  be  best  for 
England  as  well  as  for  Canada  and  the  continent  to 
which  Canada  belonged.  England  was  uppermost  in 
my  thoughts.  But  I  was  thus  exposed  to  the  ire  of 
Imperialists,  to  some  of  whom  the  character  and  man- 
ners of  the  English  gentleman  were  an  object  rather  of 
praise  than  of  imitation. 

To  grace  their  movement,  the  Imperial  Federationists 
brought  over  a  Duke.  On  a  very  hot  day  he  was  driv- 
ing with  a  party  of  which  I  was  one.  Opposite  him  sat 
a  Mayor,  who  took  his  hat  off.  The  Duke,  taking  this 

[l  Mr.  Henri  Bourassa  was  born  at  Montreal,  1868 ;  elected  to 
the  House  of  Commons,  for  the  County  of  Labelle,  1896 ;  resigned 
in  1899,  to  protest  against  the  sending  of  Canadian  troops  to  South 
Africa,  and  re-elected  by  acclamation  in  1900 ;  also  in  1900  and  in 
1904 ;  resigned  in  1907  to  stand  in  Bellechasse  County  against  Hon. 
A.  Turgeon,  for  the  local  legislature,  and  defeated ;  elected  in  1908, 
in  St.  James  division,  against  Sir  Lomer  Gouin,  Prime  Minister,  and 
in  St.  Hyacinthe,  choosing  to  keep  the  latter  division.l 


428  REMINISCENCES 

for  an  act  of  social  homage,  bent  condescendingly  for- 
ward and  said,  "Pray,  Mr.  Mayor,  keep  your  hat  on." 
"Thank  your  Grace,  I  was  only  cooling  my  head." 

I  never  could  see  that  anything  but  false  ambition  and 
inflation  of  vanity  came  or  could  come  of  granting  titles 
to  colonists.  The  medieval  and  military  title  of  knight- 
hood is  grotesquely  out  of  place  in  a  modern  and  com- 
mercial community.  Titles  of  office  are  all  right ;  they 
increase  respect  for  it.  Perhaps  titles  of  mere  honour 
may  have  a  use ;  but  let  them  be  appropriate,  and  let 
them  be  bestowed  by  the  community  to  which  those  on 
whom  they  are  conferred  belong.  Bestowed  from  with- 
out they  not  only  intoxicate,  but  estrange.  Canada 
certainly  suffers  in  the  estrangement  of  her  leading  men 
from  their  looking  to  a  fountain  of  honour  elsewhere. 

With  the  politics  of  Canada,  otherwise  than  as  a 
looker-on  and  critic,  I  did  not  meddle.  They  were  the 
politics  of  party  when  the  cause  of  party  had  ceased  to 
exist,  as  it  did  after  the  Governor-Generalship  of  Lord 
Elgin.  In  my  time  there  was  absolutely  no  political 
issue  of  any  moment,  nothing  but  a  struggle  for  place 
carried  on  by  intrigue  and  corruption,  extending  un- 
fortunately to  legislation  and  appointments.  To  carry 
through  Parliament  a  Bill 1  forcing  Roman  Catholic 
schools  on  two  Provinces  of  the  North- West,  the  Ro- 
man Catholic  Prime  Minister  raised  the  sessional  indem- 

p  He  is  referring  to  the  so-called  Autonomy  Bills  of  the  Dominion 
Parliament  of  1905,  transforming  a  large  portion  of  the  North- West 
Territories  of  Canada  into  the  Provinces  of  Alberta  and  Saskatche- 
wan.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  429 

nities  of  both  Houses  of  Parliament,  created  a  number 
of  pensions,  and  granted  a  salary  to  the  leader  of  the 
Opposition.  To  serve  a  political  purpose  one  who  had 
not  practised  law  for  twenty  years  was  made  Chief 
Justice.  Of  legal  patronage  generally  party  use  was 
made,  injurious  to  the  independence  both  of  Bench  and 
Bar.  "Graft "  was  the  slang  name  for  corruption  among 
the  people,  who  complained  truly  but  helplessly  that 
everything  was  full  of  it.  At  a  farmers'  picnic  I  drew 
a  farmer  aside  and  asked  him  what  was  the  difference  in 
principle  between  his  party  and  the  other.  He  was  long 
in  answering,  but  at  last  he  replied,  "We  say  the  other 
fellows  are  corrupt."  The  world  will  not  go  on  in  this 
way  for  ever. 

Lord  Durham's  postulate  that  the  French  of  Quebec 
must  be  anglicized  to  complete  the  work  of  political 
fusion  had  not  been  fulfilled.1  The  French  were  French 
still,  socially  and  politically  as  well  as  in  language,  and 
politicians  were  and  still  are  as  much  as  ever  compelled 
to  court  them.  Jesuitism,  which  European  morality 
even  in  Catholic  Kingdoms  had  spewed  out  a  century 
before,  was  recognized  by  Government  and  reinstated 
in  its  emoluments  and  its  power  of  killing  truth.2 

I1  The  reference,  I  think,  is  to  pages  124,  et  seq.,  of  Lord  Durham's 
Report  (as  printed  in  pamphlet  form  at  Toronto  by  Robert  Stanton 
in  1839).  I  may  quote  here,  as  explanation,  one  sentence :  — 

"It  must  henceforth  be  the  first  and  steady  purpose  of  the  British 
Government  to  establish  an  English  population,  with  English  laws 
and  language,  in  this  Province,  and  to  trust  its  Government  to  none 
but  a  decidedly  English  Legislature."] 

[2  This  refers  to  the  rather  celebrated  Jesuits'  Estates  Bill,  by 


430  REMINISCENCES 

The  separation  of  the  Provinces,  among  which  there 
was  little  interchange  of  population,  the  course  of  mi- 
gration being  to  the  States,  was  a  serious  political  evil. 
I  do  not  know  at  this  moment  what  are  the  politics,  or 
who  are  the  political  leaders  of  the  Provinces  on  the 
Atlantic  or  of  those  on  the  Pacific  coast.  The  interests 
and  connections  of  those  Provinces  must  in  part  be 
nearly  as  much  American  as  Canadian,  the  American 
tariff  notwithstanding. 

The  great  man  of  Canadian  politics,  when  first  I  came 
to  Canada,  was  Sir  John  Macdonald,1  who  ruled  the 
country  for  many  years.  A  very  curious  and  notable 
character  he  was.  The  study  of  his  life  from  his  earliest 
years  had  been  the  manipulation  of  human  nature  for 
the  purposes  of  party.  In  that  craft  he  was  unrivalled. 
A  statesman  in  the  higher  sense  he  was  not,  nor  an  ad- 
ministrator. His  principles,  his  economical  principles 
especially,  were  the  shifts  of  the  hour.  Only  in  his 
attachment  to  the  British  Crown,  and  in  his  determina- 
tion, as  he  said,  to  die  a  British  subject,  could  he  be  said 
to  be  firm.  He  was  personally  very  attractive,  bright, 
good-humoured,  versatile,  capable  of  being  all  things 
to  all  men,  of  talking  well  on  serious  and  even  on  literary 
subjects  to  the  guests  at  one  end  of  the  table,  and  crack- 

which,  in  1888,  that  Order  obtained  from  the  Provincial  Legislature 
of  Quebec  the  sum  of  $160,000,  together  with  other  sums  paid  to 
Catholic  Colleges.  —  English  readers  will  find  a  very  succinct 
account  of  this  affair  in  the  Quarterly  Review  of  April,  1890,  Volume 
170,  No.  340,  page  534.] 

p  Born  at  Kingston,  Canada,  1815 ;  first  Prime  Minister  of  the 
Dominion  of  Canada.  Died  in  1891.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  431 

ing  rough  jokes  or  telling  risque  anecdotes  to  the  guests 
at  the  other  end.  He  was  said  to  be  like  Disraeli. 
There  may  have  been  a  slight  likeness  in  face.  The 
dark  Highland  face  has  something  of  Jewish  cast. 
Other  likeness  there  was  none.  Macdonald  had  nothing 
of  Disraeli's  imagination.  He  more  resembled  Palmer- 
ston  as  a  tactician  and  a  speaker  whose  object  was  not 
oratorical  effect,  but  the  capture  of  votes.  He  was  not 
himself  corrupt.  It  was  for  the  game  more  than  for  the 
stakes  that  he  cared.  But  he  was  unscrupulous  in  cor- 
rupting other  men.  He  decidedly  did  not  love  Spar- 
tans. He  was  credited  with  saying  that  the  perfection 
of  a  ministry  would  be  twelve  men,  each  of  whom,  if 
you  liked,  you  could  put  into  the  penitentiary.  He 
spoke  in  jest,  no  doubt ;  but  in  the  jest  there  was  a  grain 
of  truth.  On  the  eve  of  a  general  election  it  was  pointed 
out  to  him  that  some  of  his  men  were  talking  Protection- 
ism, which,  whatever  might  be  its  effect  in  such  a  coun- 
try as  the  United  States,  with  their  vast  area  of  produc- 
tion and  home  trade,  would  not  do  for  Canada.  "No," 
was  his  reply,  "you  need  not  think  I  am  going  to  get 
into  that  hole."  Scarcely  two  months  had  passed  when 
into  that  hole  he  got.  Rallied  by  his  friend  on  his 
change,  he  jauntily  replied,  "Yes,  Protection  has  done 
so  much  for  me,  that  I  must  do  something  for  Protec- 
tion." He  was  a  survivor  of  the  times  in  which  whiskey 
played  an  important  part  in  politics,  and  he  had  not 
put  off  the  habits  of  his  jovial  generation. 

Macdonald  was  not  delicate  in  the  choice  of  his  in- 


432  REMINISCENCES 

struments.  An  incident  which  I  am  going  to  mention 
showed  this  and  at  the  same  time  a  certain  sensitiveness 
which  he  retained  after  a  life  which  it  might  have  been 
supposed  would  have  thoroughly  steeled  his  nerves. 
He  came  to  my  house  for  the  wedding  of  his  son.  On 
the  evening  of  his  arrival  he  was  in  his  usual  spirits. 
Next  morning  as  we  drove  to  the  church  a  cloud  seemed 
to  have  come  over  him.  At  the  wedding  breakfast  he 
sat  perfectly  silent.  When  his  health  was  drunk,  he 
disappointed  the  company  by  merely  stumbling  through 
two  or  three  disjointed  sentences.  He  was  called  up  to 
reply  to  another  toast,  with  no  happier  result.  On 
my  return  home  I  found  the  Chief  of  Police  waiting  at 
my  door  and  desiring  to  see  Sir  John  Macdonald.  Those 
were  the  days  of  Fenianism,  and  I  fancied  that  this  was 
some  alarm  from  that  quarter.  It  turned  out,  however, 
that  an  American 1  who  had  served  Sir  John  in  some 
secret  and  probably  associated  with  him  in  some  po- 
litical business,  had  quarrelled  with  him,  and  having 
demanded  $3000  of  him  was  trying  to  indict  him  for 
perjury  and  had  chosen  the  day  of  the  marriage  for  the 
service  of  the  writ.  The  attempt,  of  course,  came  to 
nothing,  but  the  apprehension  of  it  had  evidently  been 
enough  to  upset  Sir  John  Macdonald. 

There  was  a  rupture  between  us  at  last,  caused  by  his 
hasty  assumption,  on  newspaper  authority,  of  my  con- 
nection with  a  letter  from  a  Canadian  to  an  American, 
with  which,  or  anything  in  its  contents,  as  the  recov- 

f1  General  Butt  Hewson,  I  believe,  was  the  man  who  indicted.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  433 

ery  of  a  genuine  document  proved,  I  had  absolutely 
nothing  to  do.1 

The  professions  of  George  Brown,2  the  head  of  the 
Grit  party  and  Macdonald's  mortal  enemy,  were  far 
more  moral  than  those  of  Macdonald.  Whether  he 
was  a  better  man  may  be  questioned,  while  he  unques- 
tionably was  far  less  attractive  and  amusing.  A  Lib- 
eral he  might  call  himself;  but  it  could  be  only  in  a 
party  sense.  Of  liberality  of  character  and  sentiment, 
of  breadth  of  view  or  toleration  of  difference  of  opinion, 
no  human  being  was  ever  more  devoid.  Master  of  The 
Globe,3  which  then,  unhappily  for  the  country,  was  the 
only  powerful  paper,  he  used  it  without  scruple  or 
mercy  to  crush  everybody  who  would  not  bow  to  his 
will.  For  this  work  he  had  congenial  instruments  in  his 
brother  Gordon  4  and  his  chief  writer  Inglis,5  a  Presby- 

[r  This  was  in  1901.  —  The  incident  is  fully  explained  in  pages 
501  to  503  of  the  second  volume  of  Mr.  John  Mercier  McMullen's 
"The  History  of  Canada,  from  its  First  Discovery  to  the  Present 
Time."  Third  edition.  Brockville :  McMullen  &  Co.  1892.] 

[2  George  Brown  was  born  in  1818  near  Edinburgh ;  went  to 
America  in  1838 ;  founded  The  Globe  in  Toronto  in  March,  1844 ; 
Radical  M.P.  for  County  of  Kent  (Ontario),  1851 ;  M.P.  for  Lamb- 
ton  County,  1854 ;  for  Toronto,  1857-1861 ;  for  South  Oxford,  1863- 
1867;  Prime  Minister  (for  four  days)  in  1858;  appointed  to  the 
Senate,  1873 ;  died  in  Toronto,  1880.] 

[3  A  daily  morning  newspaper  published  at  Toronto.] 

[4  Gordon  Brown,  a  younger  brother.  He  was  born  at  Alloa, 
Scotland,  in  1827.  He  was  chief  editor  of  The  Globe  for  many  years 
before  the  death  of  his  brother  George  in  1880,  and  retained  the  post 
till  1882.  In  that  year  he  was  appointed  Registrar  of  the  Surrogate 
Court  of  the  County  of  York,  Ontario,  in  which  office  he  remained 
tiU  his  death  in  1896.] 

[B  Rev.  William  Inglis  was  a  Presbyterian  minister,  educated  in 
Edinburgh,  and  had  been  pastor  of  a  congregation  near  London, 

2? 


434  REMINISCENCES 

terian  minister  instinct  with  the  spirit  of  the  West- 
minster Confession.  The  headship  of  a  party  and  the 
editorship  of  a  paper  ought  not  to  be  in  the  same 
hands.  When  they  are,  the  judge  is  confounded  with 
the  advocate  or  with  something  still  more  unfair  or 
bitter.  The  best  of  Brown  was  his  fidelity  to  the  cause 
of  the  North  during  the  American  war  of  Secession. 
On  the  other  hand,  he  traded  long  on  the  antipathy  of 
the  British  and  Protestant  to  the  French  and  Catholic 
Province,  a  very  mischievous  and  unpatriotic  line.  For 
one  moment  George  Brown  touched  the  goal  of  his  am- 
bition,1 having  in  consequence  of  a  mere  Parliamentary 
accident  been  called  upon  to  form  a  Government.  But 
he  immediately  fell,  raging  through  his  organ  against 
Sir  Edmund  Head,2  who  had  very  properly  refused  him 
a  dissolution.  In  his  large  and  burly  body  dwelt  a 
strong  but  thoroughly  coarse  mind.  When  pitted 
against  Sir  John  Macdonald  in  the  Confederation  Gov- 
ernment 3  he  soon  felt  his  own  inferiority  and  withdrew 
to  his  despotic  reign  in  the  office  of  The  Globe.  There 
is  in  Mr.  Pope's  life  of  Sir  John  Macdonald  an  admirable 
picture  of  George  Brown  as  he  appeared  on  the  platform.4 

Ontario.  In  the  later  sixties  and  seventies  lie  was  an  editorial  writer 
on  the  Toronto  Globe,  and  thus  acquired  a  reputation  for  culture 
and  causticity.  He  was  afterwards  assistant  librarian  to  the  On- 
tario Legislature,  and  occupied  that  position  till  his  death  in  1900.] 

I1  July  the  31st,  1858.] 

[2  Sir  Edmund  Walker  Head,  Baronet,  Governor-General  of 
Canada  from  1854  to  1861.  Born  1805;  died  1868.] 

P  Of  1867,  after  the  passing  of  the  British  North  America  Act.] 

[4  "Memoirs  of  the  Right  Honourable  Sir  John  Alexander 
Macdonald,  G.C.B.,  First  Prime  Minister  of  the  Dominion  of  Can- 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  435 

The  Leader?  the  Conservative  organ,  was  then  in  its 
last  stage  of  decrepitude.  Our  hopes  of  emancipation 
and  literary  decency  were  excited  when  The  Mail 
appeared  2  announcing  that  it  would  be  written  by 
gentlemen  and  for  gentlemen.  But  soon  those  hopes 
were  dashed.  The  Mail  had  hardly  run  through  a  dozen 
numbers  when  it  proved  itself  to  be  a  counterpart  of 
The  Globe  or  worse.  It  has  happily  long  since  changed 
hands.  I  have  lived  to  see  a  marked  improvement  in 
the  Canadian  press.  The  metropolitan  organs  are  both 
in  character  and  in  literary  ability  superior  to  The 
Globe  and  Mail  of  former  days;  while  the  local  press, 
which  used  to  follow  slavishly  in  the  train  of  The  Globe, 
has  decidedly  gained  in  strength  and  freedom.  The 
day  of  perfect  independence,  independence  not  only  of 
party,  but  of  popular  passion  and  of  secret  influence, 
personal  or  commercial,  can  hardly  be  said  yet  to  have 
dawned.  Great  will  be  the  gratitude  to  the  proprietor 
of  any  journal  which  can  hasten  its  coming. 

Alexander  Mackenzie  3  was  a  thoroughly  honest  man, 
a  faithful  servant  of  the  public  and  steward  of  the  public 
interests.  He  deserves  a  statue  far  more  than  some  who 

ada."  By  Joseph  Pope.  2  vols.  London :  Edward  Arnold.  1894. 
Volume  I,  pages  320,  et  seq.] 

[l  The  Leader,  published  at  Toronto,  was  founded  by  James 
Beaty  in  1856,  and  ceased  on  October  5,  1878.] 

[2  March  the  31st,  1872.  —  The  Mail  was  another  Toronto  morn- 
ing daily.] 

[3  Born  near  Dunkeld,  in  Perthshire,  in  1822 ;  emigrated  to  Can- 
ada in  1842.  He  was  a  builder  and  contractor  at  Sarnia,  in  the 
Province  of  Ontario,  in  1848.  M.P.P.,  1861-1867 ;  M.P.,  1867 ; 
Prime  Minister,  1873-1878.  Died  in  1892.] 


436  REMINISCENCES 

have  had  one.  In  fact,  he  owed  his  fall  from  power1 
partly  to  the  integrity  with  which  he  guarded  the  public 
chest  against  raiders,  while  his  manner  perhaps  was 
made  somewhat  repellent  by  the  incessant  worrying 
which  he  endured.  He  also  overworked  himself  by 
excessive  attention  to  details.  This  was  the  cast  of  his 
mind.  He  had  risen  from  the  ranks,  having  originally 
been  a  stone-mason.  This  made  him  popular  with  the 
Democracy,  but  a  malicious  critic  might  have  said  that 
if  his  strong  point  was  having  been  a  stone-mason,  his 
weak  point  was  being  a  stone-mason  still. 

John  Sandfield  Macdonald  2  has  a  pleasant  place  in 
my  memory.  He  was  a  thoroughly  good  fellow,  and 
honest,  though  he  had  to  deal  with  an  element  which 
Was  difficult  to  manage  by  strictly  honest  methods.  I 
went  to  him  one  day  and  said,  "  Macdonald,  I  have 
come  to  ask  you  for  a  place."  He  looked  very  glum. 
"For  two  seats,"  I  said,  "in  the  gallery  at  the  opening 
of  the  Session."  The  look  of  painful  constraint  fled 
from  his  countenance.  "The  Sergeant-at-Arms  will 
send  you  four  tickets  at  once,"  he  said. 

Another  Canadian  politician  of  mark  with  whom  I 
came  into  contact  was  Joseph  Howe  3  the  favourite  son 

I1  September  the  17th,  1878,  when  Sir  John  Macdonald  brought 
in  his  protective  tariff.] 

[2  Born  at  St.  Raphael,  Upper  Canada,  in  1812 ;  Prime  Minister 
of  Upper  Canada  in  1862;  first  Prime  Minister  of  Ontario  (1867). 
Died  1872.] 

[3  Born  at  Halifax,  N.  S.,  in  1804 ;  a  journalist  and  writer  of 
much  repute  in  his  younger  days ;  Member  in  the  local  Parlia- 
ment;  also  Speaker;  Provincial  Secretary;  Governor  of  Nova 
Scotia  in  1873  ;  died  the  same  year.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  437 

and  renowned  orator  of  Nova  Scotia.  He  came  to  Eng- 
land when  I  was  there  to  demand  the  liberation  of  Nova 
Scotia  from  Federation,  into  which  they  had  been  in- 
veigled by  the  black  arts  of  Sir  Charles  Tupper.  Apply- 
ing to  Lord  Campbell/  Howe  was  by  him  introduced  to 
me.  He  attended  a  dinner  at  which  the  chiefs  of  the 
Liberal  party  were  present,  and  made  a  speech  somewhat 
too  eloquent  for  a  rather  unimpressionable  audience  of 
old  politicians,  threatening  bloodshed  if  his  Province 
were  not  set  free.  The  Liberals  accordingly  moved  in 
Parliament.  But  scarcely  had  they  done  this  when  the 
news  came  that  Mr.  Howe  was  in  a  Confederation  Gov- 
ernment.2 His  apologists  say  that  he  yielded  to  destiny. 
But  destiny,  if  it  requires  submission,  hardly  requires 
acceptance  of  place.  About  Howe's  eloquence,  it 
seems,  there  could  be  no  doubt,  though  when  I  heard 
him  it  was  rather  overstrained. 

Sir  Francis  Hincks  3  was  our  greatest  economist  and 
financier.  I  always  read  him  with  respect  and  profit. 
But  his  political  course  had  been  somewhat  tortuous, 
and  fortune  more  than  once  entrapped  him  into  un- 
lucky situations. 

I  felt  great  respect  for  the  character  and  abilities  of 

[l  I  suppose  this  is  William  Frederick  Campbell,  Lord  Stratheden 
and  second  Lord  Campbell,  son  of  John,  the  first  Baron  Campbell, 
Lord  Chancellor.] 

[2  In  1870  he  was  appointed  Secretary  of  State  for  the  Five  Prov- 
inces in  the  Dominion  of  Canada.] 

[3  Born  1807 ;  emigrated  to  Canada,  1831 ;  M.P.,  1841 ;  Inspector 
General  of  Public  Accounts ;  Prime  Minister,  1851-1854 ;  Finance 
Minister,  1869-1873.  Died  in  1885.] 


438  REMINISCENCES 

Mr.  Huntington.1  In  his  prosecution  of  the  Pacific 
Railway  scandal  he  served  the  public  admirably  well, 
showing  great  ability  and  courage,  combined  with  per- 
fect self-command.  Indolence,  which  perhaps  had  a 
physical  cause,  prevented  his  doing  more  than  he 
did. 

Sir  Richard  Cartwright 2  was  a  strong  man  in  every- 
way. For  many  years  he  was  the  doughty  advocate 
of  free  trade  and  reduced  expenditure.  But  in  his  last 
years  he  sank  into  an  easy  chair,  and  allowed  the  Gov- 
ernment of  which  he  was  a  member  to  lay  both  his  great 
principles  completely  on  the  shelf. 

Sir  Charles  Tupper  3  was  a  man  of  extraordinary  force 
and  a  thunderer  of  the  platform,  though  the  staple  of 
his  oratory  was  purely  exaggeration,  with  a  large  meas- 
ure of  rather  vulgar  invective.  Unwearied,  undaunted, 
and  unabashed,  while  he  served  as  the  shield-bearer 
of  Sir  John  Macdonald,  he  was  very  useful  to  his 

p  The  Hon.  Lucius  Seth  Huntington,  Member  of  Parliament  for 
the  County  of  Shefford,  in  the  Dominion  House.  It  was  Mr 
Huntington  who,  on  the  2d  of  April,  1873,  moved  "That  a  Com- 
mittee of  seven  members  be  appointed  to  inquire  into  all  the  cir- 
cumstances connected  with  the  negotiations  for  the  construction 
of  the  Pacific  Railway,  with  the  legislation  of  last  session  on  the 
subject,  and  with  the  granting  of  the  Charter  to  Sir  Hugh  Allan 
and  others.  .  .  ."] 

P  The  Right  Hon.  Sir  Richard  Cartwright,  G.C.M.G.,  is  Minister 
of  Trade  and  Commerce  for  Canada,  and  has  been  M.  P.  for  South 
Oxford,  Ontario,  since  1896.  Born  in  1835.] 

P  The  Honourable  Sir  Charles  Tupper,  first  Baronet,  G.C.M.G. ; 
has  held  numerous  high  political  posts,  including  many  of  Cabinet 
rank ;  High  Commissioner  for  Canada,  1883-1887,  and  1888-1896 ; 
Prime  Minister  of  Canada,  1890.  Born  in  1821.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  439 

chief,  whose  apparently  lost  cause  he  did  much  to 
redeem  after  the  catastrophe  of  the  Pacific  Railway 
scandal. 

Of  the  few  people  in  England  who  thought  about  co- 
lonial subjects  in  my  day,  the  general  opinion  was  that 
the  destiny  of  the  colonies  was  independence.  I 
brought  that  opinion,  certainly  not  one  disparaging 
either  to  the  colonies  or  to  the  Mother-country,  with  me 
to  Canada.  It  drew  me  to  a  set  of  Canadian  youths 
strongly  imbued  with  it.  They  made  me  the  President 
of  their  National  Club,  founded  for  the  union  and  inter- 
course of  all  patriotic  Canadians  without  distinction  of 
political  party.  But  on  view  of  the  situation,  geo- 
graphical, racial,  social,  and  commercial,  I  was  led  to 
the  conviction  that  the  separation  of  the  two  great 
bodies  of  English-speaking  people  on  the  American  con- 
tinent would  not  last  forever,  and  that  union,  free  and 
equal,  was  in  this  case,  as  it  had  been  in  the  case  of 
Scotland  and  England,  the  decree  of  destiny.  The 
word  Annexation,  implying  a  forced  submission  on  the 
part  of  Canada,  never  passed  my  lips.  That  ultimate 
union  was  my  opinion  I  avowed,  and  it  exposed  me  to 
the  insults  and  scurrility  of  a  violent  separationist,  and, 
as  it  was  called,  United  Empire  Loyalist  clique  which 
tried  to  expel  me  from  the  St.  George's  Society,  with- 
out success;  though  the  behaviour  of  the  Club  on  the 
occasion,  seeing  that  I  had  simply  held  my  personal 
opinions  and  done  nothing  whatever  to  compromise  the 
Club,  and  that  the  Club  was  purely  social  and  benefi- 


440  REMINISCENCES 

cent,  was  hardly  such  as  that  of  English  gentlemen 
would  have  been. 

That  I  was  at  the  bottom  of  the  Annexationist  move- 
ment of  1892  is  completely  disproved  by  the  very  letter 
produced  in  proof  of  it.1  The  movement  had  its  origin 
in  commercial  discontent,  as  well  among  the  agricul- 

[l  I  append  the  letter  :  — 

"TORONTO,  Dec.  2,  1892. 
"  THE  SECRETARY  OP  THE  CONTINENTAL  ASSOCIATION  OP  ONTARIO  : 

"  Dear  Sir.  —  As  the  Continental  Association  does  me  the  honour 
to  think  that  my  name  may  be  of  use  to  it,  I  have  pleasure  in  accept- 
ing the  presidency  on  the  terms  on  which  it  is  offered,  as  an  honor- 
ary appointment.  From  active  participation  in  any  political  move- 
ment I  have  found  it  necessary  to  retire. 

"  Your  object,  as  I  understand  it,  is  to  procure  by  constitutional 
means,  and  with  the  consent  of  the  Mother-country,  the  submission 
of  the  question  of  continental  union  to  the  free  suffrage  of  the  Cana- 
dian people,  and  to  furnish  the  people  with  the  information  neces- 
sary to  prepare  them  for  the  vote.  In  this  there  can  be  nothing 
unlawful  or  disloyal. 

"  That  a  change  must  come,  the  returns  of  the  census,  the  condi- 
tion of  our  industries,  especially  of  our  farming  industry,  and  the 
exodus  of  the  flower  of  our  population,  too  clearly  show.  Sentiment 
is  not  to  be  disregarded,  but  genuine  sentiment  is  never  at  variance 
with  the  public  good.  Love  of  the  Mother-country  can  be  stronger 
in  no  heart  than  it  is  in  mine  ;  but  I  have  satisfied  myself  that  the 
interest  of  Great  Britain  and  that  of  Canada  are  one. 

"  Let  the  debate  be  conducted  in  a  spirit  worthy  of  the  subject. 
Respect  the  feelings  and  the  traditions  of  those  who  differ  from  us, 
while  you  firmly  insist  on  the  right  of  the  Canadian  people  to  per- 
fect freedom  of  thought  and  speech  respecting  the  question  of  its 
own  destiny. 

"  Yours  faithfully, 

"GOLDWIN  SMITH." 

See  "  The  Struggle  for  Imperial  Unity  :  Recollections  and  Expe- 
riences." By  Colonel  George  T.  Denison,  President  of  the  British 
Empire  League  in  Canada;  author  of  "Modern  Cavalry,"  "A 
History  of  Cavalry,"  "Soldiering  in  Canada,"  etc.  London:  The 
Macmillan  Co.  1909.  Pp.  174  and  175.  — Ed.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  441 

turists  of  Ontario  as  among  the  commercial  men  of 
Quebec.  I  was  steadily  looking  to  the  interests  of 
England,  which  I  believed  would  be  not  set  back  but 
furthered  by  the  re-union  of  her  progeny. 

The  continent  was  one.  Social  fusion  was  rapidly 
advancing.  The  commercial  union  of  the  continent 
dictated  by  nature  only  awaited  the  repeal  of  unnatural 
and  iniquitous  laws.  Drawn  to  American  centres  of 
employment,  Canadians  were  mingling  with  the  people 
of  the  United  States  at  the  rate  of  twenty  thousand  in 
a  year.  The  churches  interchanged  pastors.  A  Cana- 
dian clergyman,  just  after  reviling  continental  union  and 
its  supporters,  accepted  an  American  cure.  Societies 
such  as  that  of  the  Free  Masons  crossed  the  line.  The 
Canadian  Pacific  Railroad,  Canada's  great  line  of  com- 
munication, the  administration  of  which,  it  was  pro- 
claimed, was  to  be  purely  Canadian,  soon  had  an 
American  President.  The  Canadian  currency  was  not 
pounds  and  shillings,  but  dollars  and  cents.  Inter- 
marriage was  frequent.  Circumstance  of  every  sort, 
besides  race  and  language,  foretold  ultimate  union. 
The  attempts  of  United  Empire  Loyalism  in  Canada  to 
keep  alive  international  antipathy  were  fruitless. 

At  the  time  of  my  settling  in  the  country  there  was 
on  foot  among  the  younger  men  a  movement  called 
"Canada  First,"  the  tendency,  if  not  the  avowed  object, 
of  which  was  to  make  Canada  an  independent  nation 
linked  by  affection  to  the  Mother-country.  This  was 
my  own  idea,  as  it  was  that  of  the  British  statesmen 


442  REMINISCENCES 

from  whom  my  opinions  had  been  imbibed,  and  indeed 
of  British  statesmen  generally  in  my  day.  It  seemed 
desirable  that  there  should  be  two  experiments  in  Demo- 
cracy on  this  continent.  I  was,  besides,  attracted  by 
genuine  patriotism  and  fresh  hope.  The  most  active 
members  of  the  party  were  W.  A.  Foster  1  and  W.  H. 
Howland  2  afterwards  Mayor  of  Toronto,  Mr.  Foster 
being  the  chief  literary  exponent.  But  the  guiding 
star,  the  hero  of  the  party,  was  Mr.  Edward  Blake 3  an 
advocate  and  politician  of  the  highest  promise,  whose 
" Aurora  speech"4  had  seemed  to  open  a  new  political 

I1  William  Alexander  Foster,  Q.C.,  a  well-known  Barrister  of 
Toronto.  Died  in  1888.] 

[2  William  Holmes  Howland  was  born  at  Lamb  ton  Mills,  Ont., 
In  1844  ;  entered  upon  a  mercantile  career  early  in  life ;  elected 
Mayor  of  Toronto  in  1885  and  1886.  Died  in  1893.] 

[3The  Honourable  Edward  Blake,  K.C.  Born  at  Cairngorm, 
Ont.,  Canada,  in  1833  ;  M.P.  for  South  Longford,  Ireland,  from 
1892  till  1907.] 

[4 "  The  bond  that  united  the  Imperialists  and  the  advocates  of 
independence  was  national  spirit.  .  .  .  The  greatest  intellect  of 
the  Liberal  party  felt  the  impulse.  At  Aurora  *  (in  1874)  Edward 
Blake  startled  the  more  cautious  members  of  the  party  by  advo- 
cating the  federation  of  the  Empire,  the  reorganization  of  the 
senate,  compulsory  voting,  extension  of  the  franchise,  and  repre- 
sentation of  minorities.  His  real  theme  was  national  spirit. 
National  spirit  would  be  lacking  until  we  undertook  national  re- 
sponsibilities. He  described  the  Canadian  people  as  '  four  millions 
of  Britons  who  are  not  free.'  By  the  policy  of  England,  in  which 
we  had  no  voice  or  control,  Canada  might  be  plunged  into  the 
horrors  of  war.  Recently,  without  our  consent,  the  navigation  of 
the  St.  Lawrence  had  been  ceded  forever  to  the  United  States.  We 
could  not  complain  of  these  things  unless  we  were  prepared  to  as- 
sume the  full  responsibilities  of  citizenship  within  the  Empire.  The 
young  men  of  Canada  heard  these  words  with  a  thrill  of  en- 
thusiasm, but  the  note  was  not  struck  again.  The  movement 

*  Aurora  is  a  small  town  north  of  Toronto  in  the  Province  of  Ontario. 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  443 

era  and  given  a  terrible  shock  to  the  orthodox  and 
senile  Liberalism  of  Mr.  George  Brown  and  the  Globe. 
I  was  never  a  member  of  the  "  Canada  First  "  Associa- 
tion, and  the  National  Club,  of  which  I  was  made  Presi- 
dent, was  social,  and  intended  to  bring  together  Cana- 
dians of  all  parties.  Nor  had  I  anything  to  do  with  the 
starting  of  The  Nation,1  though  afterwards,  when  that 
journal  was  in  difficulty,  I  was  persuaded  for  some  time 
to  help  it  with  my  pen.  I  also  contributed  a  few  articles 
to  The  Liberal,'2'  which  was  set  up  by  Mr.  Edward  Blake 
as  an  organ  of  advanced  Liberalism  and  "  Canada 
First  "  sentiment  in  opposition  to  The  Globe.  I  should 
have  done  this  apart  from  any  special  movement  of 
opinion  if  it  had  been  only  from  my  desire  to  restore 
the  independence  of  the  press.  But  Mr.  Edward  Blake 
suddenly  left  his  following,  let  The  Liberal  die,  sur- 
rendered to  The  Globe,  took  office  in  the  Mackenzie 
Government,3  which  was  formed  under  the  auspices  of 
George  Brown,  and  left  his  adherents  to  the  vengeance 
of  the  enemy.  That  was  the  end  of  "Canada  First," 
and,  as  it  turned  out,  of  the  hope  of  making  Canada 
a  nation. 

apparently  ceased,  and  politics  apparently  flowed  back  into  their 
old  channels.  But  while  the  name,  the  organization,  and  the 
organs  of  '  Canada  First '  in  the  press  disappeared,  the  force  and 
spirit  remained,  and  exercised  a  powerful  influence  upon  Canadian 
politics  for  many  years."  —  "The  Makers  of  Canada:  George 
Brown."  By  John  Lewis.  Toronto  :  Morang  and  Co.  Limited. 
1906.  Page  240.  — Ed.] 

P  A  weekly  paper  published  in  Toronto  in  1874  and  1875.] 
[z  The  Toronto  Liberal;,  only  existed  from  January  to  June,  of 
1875.]  [3  In  1873.] 


444  REMINISCENCES 

Mr.  Edward  Blake  was  a  man  of  the  highest  character, 
a  powerful  advocate,  a  jurist  of  repute,  and  a  strong 
though  prolix  speaker.  But  his  career  has  shown  that 
he  mistook  his  vocation  when  he  undertook  to  be  a 
leader  of  men.  Too  much  is  said  about  the  necessity  of 
magnetism.  A  leader  may  be,  as  some  of  the  most 
powerful  leaders  —  Pitt  and  Peel  —  have  been,  desti- 
tute of  magnetism,  and  yet  have  devoted  followers  if  he 
is  unselfish  and  true  at  heart  to  his  cause,  and  to  his 
friends. 

More  than  once,  to  propitiate  the  Irish  vote,  has  the 
Parliament  at  Ottawa  voted  sympathy  with  the  demand 
for  Home  Rule,  without,  it  may  safely  be  said,  thinking 
carefully  about  the  interest  of  the  Mother-country. 
Encouraged  by  this,  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  move- 
ment 1  came  here  to  set  on  foot  an  agitation  breath- 
ing threats  against  the  Governor-General.  Lord  Lans- 
downe,  to  be  out  of  the  way  of  annoyance,  came  from 
Ottawa  to  Toronto.  In  conjunction  with  the  head  of 
the  Orangemen,  Mr.  E.  F.  Clarke,2 1  got  up  a  Defensive 
League  3  over  which  I  had  the  honour  of  presiding,  and 
which  made  in  the  Park  at  Toronto  a  strong  Loyalist 
demonstration.  The  politicians  were  nowhere  to  be 
seen.  However  loyal  they  might  be,  they  could  not 


J1  Mr.  William  O'Brien,  founder  of  the  "United  Irish  League"  ; 
M.P.  for  various  districts  in  Ireland  since  1883  ;  frequently  prose- 
cuted for  political  offences.] 

[2  Edward  Frederick  Clarke,  a  Canadian  journalist  and  politician  ; 
an  M.P. ;  once  Mayor  of  Toronto.] 

[3"  The  Loyal  and  Patriotic  Union."] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  445 

risk  the  loss  of  the  Irish  vote.  Painful  proofs  of  the 
effect  of  the  party  system  on  political  character  were 
always  presenting  themselves  in  Canada  and  were  made 
more  signal  by  the  general  honesty  of  the  people. 

Whether  my  course  on  the  Irish  question  was  right 
or  wrong,  my  motives  at  least  were  patriotic.  I  might 
smile  at  charges  of  disloyalty  levelled  against  me  by 
men  who  in  the  Dominion  Government  or  in  the  On- 
tario Legislature  helped  to  imperil  the  integrity  of  the 
United  Kingdom  by  pressing  Home  Rule  Resolutions 
for  the  purpose  of  capturing  the  Irish  vote. 

$  $  #  $  $  $  $ 

For  free  trade  against  protectionism  as  the  cause, 
not  of  a  party,  but  of  the  whole  community  and  of  hu- 
manity at  large,  I  felt  free  as  a  citizen  of  the  world,  and 
bound,  as  a  follower  and  friend  of  Bright  and  Cobden, 
to  do  my  best.  My  best  I  did,  as  the  "Handbook  of 
Commercial  Union''1  will  testify,  and  if  the  Evil  One 
was  then  too  strong  for  us,  discussion  enlightens  and 
helps  the  cause.  There  is  the  same  battle  to  be  fought 
on  both  sides  of  the  line,  and  with  the  same  disadvan- 
tage, the  forces  of  protectionism  being  concentrated  hi 
a  compact  party  with  a  wily  leader,  while  those  of  free 
trade  were  scattered.  A  Canadian  plunderer  of  the 

[l "  Handbook  of  Commercial  Union :  A  collection  of  papers 
read  before  the  Commercial  Club  of  Toronto,  with  speeches,  letters, 
and  other  documents  in  favor  of  Unrestricted  Reciprocity  with  the 
United  States."  Preceded  by  an  introduction  by  Mr.  Goldwin 
Smith.  Edited  by  G.  Mercer  Adam.  Toronto  :  Hunter,  Rose  and 
Co.  1888.] 


446  REMINISCENCES 

people,  a  man  himself  living  in  a  fine  house,  said  the 
other  day  that  he  would  like  to  see  a  wall  as  high  as 
Hainan's  gallows  between  the  two  parts  of  a  continent 
which  nature  has  most  manifestly  decreed  to  be  com- 
mercially one. 

It  was  as  an  Englishman  that  I  took  part  hi  the  move- 
ment in  favour  of  Reciprocity  with  the  United  States, 
the  manifest  dictate,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  of  nature 
and  of  the  interest  of  the  Canadian  people.  Every 
movement  of  this  kind  is  in  a  line  with  the  free-trade 
policy  which  has  hitherto  been  that  of  Great  Britain. 
But  the  league  of  log-rolling  monopolies  hi  the  United 
States  was  too  strong  for  us,  and  too  strong  for  us  and 
for  the  real  interests  of  the  American  and  Canadian 
people  to  this  hour  it  remains.  Of  the  ultimate  triumph 
of  those  views  I  feel  no  doubt. 

Another  movement,  rather  social  than  political,  in 
which  I  took  part  was  that  of  the  Liberal  Temperance 
Union,  formed  to  advocate  a  more  hopeful  mode  of 
dealing  with  the  liquor  question  than  that  of  the  en- 
thusiasts who  fancied  that  they  could  at  once  extin- 
guish by  legislation  a  taste  coeval  and  almost  coex- 
tensive with  humanity.  A  part  of  our  policy  was  dis- 
crimination in  favour  of  the  lighter  against  the  stronger 
drinks.  With  two  companions,  Mr.  Mouat l  and  Mr. 
Richardson,2  I  went  through  a  campaign  against  the 

[*  J.  Gordon  Mouat,  a  journalist  of  Toronto.  At  one  time  edi- 
tor of  The  Lake  Magazine.] 

PC.  Gordon  Richardson,  an  expert  analytical  chemist  and  (I 
think)  medical  man  of  Toronto.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  447 

Scott  Act 1  which  was  producing  the  inevitable  effects 
of  extreme  prohibitive  legislation  in  contraband  trade, 
contempt  of  law,  perjury,  secret  drinking,  and  prac- 
tically increased  intemperance.  In  the  upshot,  the 
Scott  Act  was  repealed  in  almost  every  county  which 
had  adopted  it  by  larger  majorities  than  those  by  which 
it  had  been  carried.  My  campaign  showed  me  a  good 
deal  of  the  country  and  of  the  people,  as  well  as  of  the 
rural  hotels  of  Canada,  which,  for  the  most  part,  at 
that  time  left  much  to  be  desired. 

I  may  say  that  I  had  called  upon  Neal  Dow 2  at  Port- 
land,3 and  had  satisfied  myself,  from  the  bitterness  with 
which  the  good  man  spoke  of  the  state  of  things  there, 
that  his  system  of  absolute  prohibition  had  miscarried, 
as  the  general  evidence  shows.  He  half  in  earnest  said 
he  should  like  to  hang  a  woman  who,  when  her  husband 
had  been  imprisoned  for  a  liquor  offence,  sold  some 
liquor  which  he  had  left  in  the  house  to  buy  herself 
bread. 

Perhaps  the  most  important,  or  least  unimportant, 
of  my  interventions  and  meddlings  with  public  affairs 
was  the  sequel  of  the  movement  called  that  of  the 
Patrons.4  The  Patrons  were  a  body  of  farmers,  who, 

[J This  was  the  popular  name  of  the  "  Canada  Temperance  Act" 
(41  Viet.  chap.  16),  passed  in  1878  by  the  Dominion  Parliament 
after  much  petitioning  and  campaigning  by  the  Temperance  Party. 
It  was  a  sort  of  stringent  Local  Option  measure.  —  Ed.] 

[2  The  noted  American  advocate  of  the  prohibition  of  the  sale  of 
intoxicating  beverages.  He  drafted  the  Maine  prohibitory  law  in 
1851.] 

[3  In  the  State  of  Maine.]  [4  The  Patrons  of  Industry.] 


448  REMINISCENCES 

with  abundant  reason,  had  combined  for  the  protection 
of  the  legislative  interests  of  their  order.  The  move- 
ment for  a  time  was  very  successful ;  it  almost  swept 
Ontario,  and  sent  a  large  representation  to  the  Provin- 
cial Legislature.  But  on  that  floor  the  Patrons,  with 
their  political  inexperience,  and  their  simple-minded 
openness  to  intrigue,  were  between  the  two  regular 
parties  as  a  flock  of  sheep  between  two  packs  of  wolves, 
and  the  result  was  a  collapse.  The  movement  had  an 
organ  in  The  Sun,1  which  was  on  the  point  of  sharing 
the  doom  of  the  Association.  I  rescued  it  from  extinc- 
tion, helped  to  make  it  the  organ  of  an  Association 
acting  upon  the  Legislature  instead  of  acting  in  it,  and 
contributed  regularly  letters  on  general  politics  signed 
"  Bystander."  Giving  my  money  and  my  work,  I 
claimed  the  privilege  of  expressing  my  own  opinions, 
which,  however,  were,  I  believe,  essentially  the  same  as 
those  of  my  friends  and  coadjutors  in  the  work,  Walter 
D.  Gregory 2  and  Gordon  Waldron.3 

Alone,  or  almost  alone,  I  wrote  against  the  attacks 
upon  the  independence  of  the  South  African  Republic. 
Great  unpopularity  for  a  time  was  of  course  the  result. 
The  people  went  mad,  as 'they  always  do  when  an  appeal 
is  made  by  the  party  of  war  to  the  savage  passions 

[l  A  weekly  paper  published  at  Toronto.] 

[2  Walter  Dymond  Gregory,  a  Barrister  and  Solicitor  of  Toronto, 
born  at  Gaundle  Farm,  Montacute,  Somersetshire,  England,  in  1860  ; 
his  parents  emigrated  to  Canada  nine  years  afterwards ;  he  was  called 
to  the  Bar  in  1887,  and  has  since  practised  at  Toronto.] 

[3  Gordon  Waldron,  a  Barrister  and  Solicitor  of  Toronto  ;  born  at 
Storrington,  Ont.,  in  1864.] 


CANADIAN  POLITICS  449 

which  still  lurk  beneath  the  varnished  surface  of  civili- 
zation. The  Sun  for  the  time  lost  half  its  circulation, 
though  it  regained  its  position  and  profited  ultimately 
in  every  respect  by  the  proof  which  it  had  given  of  its 
perfect  independence.  A  journal  which  sets  out  to  be 
independent  has  no  longer  to  dread  the  scissors  of  the 
censor,  but  it  must  expect  to  face  the  madness  of  the 
people  as  well  as  the  bigotry  of  party.  There  is,  how- 
ever, nothing  in  my  life  on  which  I  look  back  with  more 
satisfaction  than  I  do  to  the  part  played  by  me,  how- 
ever feebly,  in  defence  of  justice,  humanity,  the  faith  of 
treaties,  national  independence,  and  at  the  same  time 
the  honour  of  my  country,  for  ever  sullied  by  foul  and 
perfidious  oppression  of  the  weak. 


2G 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

MY    LIFE   IN    CANADA 
1871-1910 

Marriage  —  "The  Grange"  —  Our  Household  —  General  Middle- 
ton  —  Civic  Charities  — •  The  Governor-Generalship  —  The 
Athletic  Club  —  Literary  Opportunities  —  The  University 
Question  —  Sports  —  Last  Days. 

IT  was  in  1871,  after  spending  two  years  at  Cornell, 
that  I  yearned  for  a  rather  more  domestic  life,  and 
went  over  to  reside  with  a  branch  of  my  family 1  settled 
in  Canada.  In  Canada  I  was  destined  finally  to  make 
my  home.  Four  years  after  my  arrival  I  married  2  my 
dear  wife  Harriet,3  the  widow  of  William  Boulton,4  and 
with  her  in  The  Grange  at  Toronto  the  rest  of  my  life 
was  most  happily  passed. 

Fortune,  however,  made  for  me  almost  an  England  of 
my  own  in  Canada.  The  Grange  at  Toronto,  with  its 
lawn  and  its  old  elms,  is  the  counterpart  in  style  and 

t1  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Charles  Colley  Foster.] 

[2  September  the  30th,  1875.] 

[3  Harriette  Elizabeth  Mann  Dixon,  only  daughter  of  Thomas 
and  Mary  Bethia  (nee  Homer)  Dixon ;  she  was  born  at  Boston  in 
1825  and  died  at  Toronto  on  September  the  9th,  1909.] 

[4  William  Henry  Boulton  was  the  son  of  D'Arcy  Boulton  (who 
built  "The  Grange"),  and  was  born  in  1812.  He  was  thrice  Mayor 
of  Toronto.  Died  February,  1874.] 

450 


M 

O 

£ 

<: 
O 


MY  LIFE   IN  CANADA  451 

surroundings  of  a  little  English  mansion.  It  is  the  only 
specimen  of  the  kind  that  I  happen  to  have  seen  on  this 
side  of  the  Atlantic.  There  were  one  or  two  more  in 
Toronto,  but  they  have  succumbed  to  progress.  The 
Grange  is  an  antiquity  among  mushrooms,  having  been 
built  in  1817.  It  originally  stood  outside  the  city, 
though  now  it  is  in  the  exact  centre.  In  summer,  when 
the  trees  are  in  leaf,  nothing  is  seen  from  its  door  but 
a  church  spire.  In  such  a  mansion  lived  Miss  Austen's 
Emma,  and  her  father.  We  had,  moreover,  a  household 
of  faithful  and  attached  domestics,  our  relations  with 
whom  were  like  those  of  an  English  family  in  former 
days.  The  married  ones  lived,  with  their  children,  on 
the  grounds  in  four  cottages,  which  they  took  pride  in 
making  pretty  with  flowers  and  creepers,  giving  an  air 
of  happy  life  to  the  place.  In  summer,  only  chimes 
were  wanting  to  make  me  fancy  that  I  was  in  England. 
The  great  elms  were  a  special  feature  of  the  place,  and 
to  their  whispering  under  the  starlight  I  owe  some 
lessons  in  philosophy. 

The  Grange  contained  relics  of  what  for  the  New 
World  was  the  olden  time.  It  is  now  passing,  under 
my  wife's  Will,  at  my  suggestion  and  with  my  hearty 
concurrence,  to  the  projected  Art  Museum.  Traditions 
were  attached  to  it  of  horses  killed  by  bears  in  its  gar- 
den; of  a  Red  Indian  presenting  himself  in  the  bed- 
chamber of  its  mistress;  of  British  sportsmen  losing 
themselves  in  the  wood  in  which  the  house  stood,  and 
being  guided  to  the  house  by  a  light  in  its  windows.  It 


452  REMINISCENCES 

seems  to  have  been  a  social  centre  and  political  rendez- 
vous of  the  Family  Compact.1  Among  other  relics  of 
an  olden  time  preserved  in  it  were  the  wine-glasses  of 
Governor  Simcoe,2  without  stands,  so  that  you  had  to 
empty  them  before  you  put  them  down.  I  have  seen 
at  a  grand  table  in  Ireland  the  waiters  remaining  when 
the  cloth  had  been  drawn  and  standing  behind  the  chairs 
to  fill  up  the  half-empty  glass  the  moment  it  was  put 
down. 

My  wife  was  an  excellent  manager,  and  we  had  really 
the  counterpart  of  an  old  English  household,  a  thing 
rare  on  this  side  of  the  water,  rarer  in  England  probably 


designation  'Family  Compact,'  .  .  .  did  not  owe  its 
origin  to  any  combination  of  North  American  colonists,  but  was 
borrowed  from  the  diplomatic  history  of  Europe.  By  the  treaty 
signed  at  Paris  on  the  15th  of  August,  1761,  by  representatives  on 
behalf  of  France  and  Spain,  the  contracting  parties  agreed  to  guar- 
antee each  other's  territories,  to  provide  mutual  succours  by  sea  and 
land,  and  to  consider  the  enemy  of  either  as  the  enemy  of  both. 
This  treaty,  being  contracted  between  the  two  branches  of  the  House 
of  Bourbon,  is  known  to  History  as  the  Family  Compact  Treaty, 
and  the  name  was  adopted  in  the  Canadas,  as  well  as  in  the  Maritime 
Provinces,  to  designate  the  combination  which  enjoyed  a  monopoly 
of  power  and  place  in  the  community,  and  among  the  members 
whereof  there  seemed  to  be  a  perfect,  if  unexpressed,  understanding, 
that  they  were  to  make  common  cause  against  any  and  all  persons 
who  might  attempt  to  diminish  or  destroy  their  influence.  —  '  The 
Story  of  the  Upper  Canadian  Rebellion  ;  Largely  Derived  from 
Original  Sources  and  Documents.'  By  John  Charles  Dent.  C. 
Blackett  Robinson  :  Toronto.  1885.  —  But  Mr.  Dent's,  perhaps, 
may  be  regarded  as  an  ex  parte  statement.  Lord  Durham,  in  his 
Report,  says  of  the  phrase  '  Family  Compact  '  that  it  was  '  a  name 
not  much  more  appropriate  than  party  designations  usually  are.'  " 
—  Ed.] 

[2  John  Graves  Simcoe,  first  Governor  of  Upper  Canada  (1792- 
1794)  ;  afterwards  Governor  of  San  Domingo.  Born  in  1752  ;  died 
in  1806.] 


MY  LIFE   IN   CANADA  453 

than  it  was.  Our  butler  1  had  been  in  The  Grange  for 
forty  years.  A  servant 2  with  whom  I  had  parted, 
thirty  years  after  his  departure  sent  me  from  England 
Christmas  holly,  which  is  still  stuck  over  my  mantel- 
piece. 

Marriage  settled  me  in  Canada.  Transplantation  to 
England,  away  from  all  my  wife's  connections  and 
associations,  would  hardly  have  been  quite  consistent 
with  my  wife's  happiness,  though  I  am  sure  she  would 
have  sweetly  consented  to  go  with  me,  and  when  we 
were  visitors  in  England  was  perfectly  at  home  in  all 
social  circles.  She  was  by  birth  a  Bostonian,  and  had 
been  much  in  Europe. 

Whatever  might  be  said,  I  never  had  any  intention 
of  entering  public  life  in  Canada.3  An  overture  made 

P  At  the  time  of  Goldwin  Smith's  death,  William  Chin's  term 
of  service  at  The  Grange  was  fifty-two  years  lacking  a  month.] 

[2  James  Cooper,  coachman.  Afterwards  in  the  Royal  Artil- 
lery, I  think.] 

[3  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  must  have  forgotten  that  on  April  the 
18th,  1874,  he  wrote  from  15,  The  Crescent,  Oxford,  in  his  own 
hand  to  Mr.  Charles  Lindsey,  of  Toronto,  as  follows  :  — 
"Mr  DEAR  LINDSEY, 
*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *• 

"  It  is  not  easy  at  this  distance  to  see  what  is  going  on,  but  I 
fear  '  Canada  First '  has  taken  the  field  rather  prematurely  and  got 
entangled,  by  its  sense  of  its  own  weakness,  in  equivocal  and  com- 
promising alliances. 

"  I  hold  to  my  intention  of  getting  into  the  Provincial  Parlia- 
ment, for  a  Session  or  two,  if  I  can ;  though  no  doubt  it  will  be 
difficult  with  George  Brown  against  me.  I  want  to  get  a  little  prac- 
tical insight  into  Canadian  politics  without  which  I  cannot  write 
about  them  with  confidence.  Here  I  was  not  in  Parliament,  but  I 
was  thrown  almost  from  boyhood  among  public  men,  which  made  up 
for  my  want  of  parliamentary  experience  in  some  measure  at  least. 


454  REMINISCENCES 

me,  though  the  special  case  was  one  which  called  for 
consideration,  was  declined.  After  settling  in  Canada, 
I  declined  an  invitation  sent  me  on  the  part  of  a  strong 
Liberal  constituency  in  England.  It  was  not  likely 
that  I  would  seek  the  suffrages  of  those  to  whom  I  was 
a  stranger.  But  as  an  independent  observer  and  writer 
I  continued  to  take  a  lively  interest  in  public  affairs. 
******* 
As  an  Englishman  I  had  now  and  then  to  take  up  the 
cudgels  for  my  country.  On  each  of  the  several  oc- 
casions on  which  the  British  Government  was  called 
upon  to  negotiate  on  behalf  of  Canada  with  foreign 
powers  there  was  an  outbreak  of  discontent  at  the  result, 
and  England  was  said  to  have  failed  to  get  justice  for  her 
colony.  It  was  forgotten  that  the  whole  responsibility 
rested  on  the  Imperial  country,  and  that  the  colony  in 
case  of  war  would  have  been  helpless.  I  took  it  upon 
me  to  say  that  the  Imperial  Government,  instead  of 
neglecting  Canadian  interests,  had  always  given  them 
most  anxious  attention,  and  done  for  them  all  that 
negotiation  could  do.  To  Canada,  defenceless  as  this 

"  You  will  not  proclaim  this,  of  course,  but  if  you  should  have 
an  opportunity  of  doing  anything  to  open  the  way  for  me,  I  will 
ask  you  kindly  to  bear  my  wish  in  mind. 

"  I  should  get  on  very  well  with  M.  Cameron,  though  we  may 
not  agree  about  the  propriety  of  cutting  off  Charles  the  First's 

head. 

"  Ever  yours  truly, 

"GOLDWIN  SMITH. 
"CHAS.  LINDSEY  ESQ." 

This  is  taken  from  the  holograph  letter  kindly  lent  me  by  Mr. 
George  G.  S.  Lindsey,  K.C.,  son  of  its  recipient.] 


MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA  455 

broken  line  of  provinces  is,  war  would  inevitably  be 
ruin. 

A  most  painful  incident  and  one  which  threw  a 
glaring  light  on  the  system  of  political  party  was  the 
attack  on  the  character  of  the  English  General,  Middle- 
ton  *  who  had  commanded  against  the  French  Half- 
Breed  rebels  at  Batoche.2  The  heart  of  the  French  at 
Quebec  had  been  with  their  rebel  kinsman,3  and  though, 
to  save  appearances,  two  battalions  of  French  militia 
were  called  out,  they  were  never  brought  into  action, 
and  one  at  least  of  the  colonels  withdrew  from  his  com- 
mand, and  the  execution  of  Kiel  was  bitterly  resented 
by  the  French  of  Quebec  and  denounced  by  their 
representatives  at  Ottawa.  To  propitiate  them  an 
attack  was  made  in  Parliament  on  General  Middleton's 
honour.  He  was  accused  of  having  stolen  a  bale  of 
furs,  of  laying  lawless  hands  on  a  billiard  table  and  a 
horse,  as  well  as  having  maltreated  the  people.  The 
poor  old  soldier,  beset  by  these  politicians,  was  be- 
wildered, and  in  that  assembly  no  one  was  found  to 
take  his  part.  He  was  in  peril  of  his  character.  I 
invited  him  to  my  house,  got  the  facts  from  him,  drew 
up  and  printed  his  case.4  Two  of  the  charges,  that  of 
stealing  or  permitting  to  be  stolen  a  billiard  table,  and 

f1  Lieutenant-General  Sir  Frederick  Dobson  Middleton,  in  com- 
mand of  the  Canadian  Militia  from  1884  till  1890.] 

[2  In  the  French  Half-Breed  rising  in  the  North-West  Territories 
of  Canada  in  1885.] 

[3  Louis  Kiel,  the  leader.] 

[4  In  the  Toronto  Evening  Telegram  of  August  the  21st,  1890, 
and  afterwards  privately  in  pamphlet  form  and  with  no  imprint.] 


456  REMINISCENCES 

that  of  seizing  a  horse,  were  dropped  for  total  lack  of 
evidence  but  without  pronouncing  a  verdict  of  acquittal. 
The  charge  of  maltreating  the  people  was  declared  to 
be  untrue  by  the  Catholic  Bishop  of  the  district.  I  got 
up  a  public  dinner  at  Toronto  for  General  Middleton, 
and  so  for  him  the  matter  ended  well.  Of  the  charge 
of  stealing  furs  no  more  was  heard  in  Parliament.  It 
seems  that  he  had  rather  hastily  allowed  a  bale  of  furs 
of  no  extraordinary  value  belonging  to  a  man  who  had 
gone  into  the  rebel  camp  to  be  divided  among  the 
members  of  his  staff.  In  the  old  country  there  is  still 
something  to  keep  the  political  game  within  the  bounds 
of  personal  honour. 

It  is  with  serener  pleasure,  however,  that  I  recall 
my  connection  of  thirty  years  with  the  charities  of 
Toronto,  in  which  my  coadjutor  was  Mr.  J.  E.  Pell, 
Secretary  of  the  St.  George's  Society,  a  man  who  has 
spent  a  long  life  in  the  humble  and  untitled  service  of 
beneficence,  a  science  of  which  he  was  the  master. 
He  lived  to  a  good  old  age,1  and  if  a  memory  charged 
with  recollections  of  good  works  could  make  him  happy, 
he  must  have  been  happy  in  his  armchair.  With 
him  I  shared  some  charitable  enterprises,  such  as  the 
labour  test  and  the  creche,  and  helped  to  do  the  little 
that  could  be  done  to  introduce  some  sort  of  organiza- 
tion and  principle  into  the  chaos  of  Toronto  charities, 
an  effort  in  which  we  had  to  face  the  stolid  indifference 
of  the  Council  and  the  bigoted  opposition  of  the  House 
I1  He  died  in  Toronto  in  February,  1903.] 


MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA  457 

of  Industry;  I  am  afraid  I  must  add  in  face  of  the 
general  apathy  of  Toronto  wealth,  the  ears  of  which 
were  little  open  to  any  appeal  of  benevolence  or  social 
duty.  It  was  from  people  of  small  or  moderate  means, 
whose  souls  were  not  enslaved  by  money,  that  most 
of  the  support  came. 

It  was  remarked  on  that  occasion,  and  I  am  afraid 
with  justice,  that  Toronto  wealth  is  not  munificent. 
It  certainly  is  not,  compared  with  the  wealth  of  the 
United  States.  The  reason  perhaps  is,  partly  at  least, 
the  comparative  weakness  of  patriotic  ambition,  and 
the  desire  of  local  gratitude  in  the  colonial  breast. 
The  colonist  who  is  making  money  looks,  perhaps 
unconsciously,  for  social  recognition  and  gratitude,  not 
.so  much  to  the  colony  in  which  his  money  is  made,  as 
to  the  Imperial  country  in  which  he  may  end  his  days, 
possibly  with  a  title. 

Once,  however,  within  my  experience  the  purse  of 
Dives  was  opened.  I  received  an  invitation  to  a  "con- 
ference "  about  a  charity  specially  patronized  by  a 
Peeress  who,  with  her  husband,  then  Governor-General, 
had  honoured  Toronto  with  a  visit.  I  went,  expecting 
what  an  invitation  to  a  conference  implied.  Instead 
of  this,  I  found  myself  in  a  large  room  full,  not  of  au- 
thorities on  questions  of  charity,  but  of  the  wealthy 
magnates  of  Toronto.  Her  Ladyship  made  a  speech 
and  left  the  room.  Then,  instead  of  a  conference  about 
her  charity,  there  was  a  call,  evidently  prearranged, 
for  a  subscription,  and  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour  or  little 


458  REMINISCENCES 

more  there  was  drawn,  in  some  cases  visibly  wrung, 
from  the  lords  of  the  dollar  a  sum  the  quarter  of  which 
local  charity  could  hardly  have  coaxed  out  of  them 
in  a  year. 

Do  what  you  will,  spout  loyalty  as  much  as  you 
please,  a  dependency  is  not  a  nation.  Of  this  the 
Governor-Generalship  is  the  symbol,  and  it  is  nothing 
more.  It  has  not  made  its  influence  felt  in  raising  social 
any  more  than  it  has  in  raising  political  character, 
or  in  controlling  political  action.  Ottawa  is  the  seat 
of  a  petty  court  and  of  all  that  a  petty  court  is  sure  to 
generate.  The  man  has  not  been  long  enough  in  Can- 
ada to  know  it  well  when  his  term  expires.  The  affec- 
tation of  Royalty  is  ridiculous.  Lord  Dufferin  l  was 
very  fond  of  making  speeches,  and  the  editor  of  a  lead- 
ing Toronto  paper  told  me  that  the  speeches  were  sent 
on  beforehand  to  the  press,  marked  with  "applause." 

Of  the  Viceregal  control  over  political  action  we  have 
just  had  an  example  in  the  passing  by  the  Governor- 
General  of  the  Act  of  a  Provincial  Parliament  which 
his  Minister  of  Justice,  in  laying  it  before  him,  desig- 
nated as  "confiscation  without  compensation,"  and 
to  force  a  way  for  which  the  Provincial  Ministry  had 
closed  the  gate  of  public  justice.2 

P  The  first  Marquess  of  Dufferin  and  Ava :  Governor-General 
of  Canada  from  1872  to  1878.] 

[2  The  reference  is  to  the  case  of  the  Florence  Mining  Company 
(Limited)  v.  the  Cobalt  Lake  Mining  Company  (Limited),  in 
which  the  ownership  of  the  property  was  in  dispute.  (See  18  On- 
tario Law  Reports,  page  275.)  The  Provincial  Legislature  passed 
two  Acts,  in  effect  confirming  the  title  of  the  defendants  :  6  Edward 


MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA  459 

My  greatest  disappointment  in  the  charitable  or 
benevolent  line  was  the  Athletic  Club,  on  the  goodly 
building  of  which,  now  turned  into  a  technical  school, 
I  look  with  sadness  when  I  pass  it.  Young  men  must 
have  pleasure;  and  young  men  in  a  city  where  they 
have  no  home  will  be  apt  to  take  to  pleasures  which 
are  not  healthy.  The  Athletic  Club,  social  as  well  as 
athletic,  was  intended  to  provide  healthy  pleasure  for 
our  numerous  bank-clerks,  and  other  young  men  em- 

VII  (1906),  Chapter  12 ;  and  7  Edward  VII  (1907),  Chapter  15 
—  the  second,  I  am  informed,  while  the  case  was  sub  judice.  —  It 
is  but  fair  to  state,  however,  that  by  the  Judgment  of  the  Privy 
Council  (delivered  on  March  the  18th,  1910),  the  plaintiffs  were 
declared  not  to  have  proved  ownership.  —  The  phrase  of  the  Min- 
ister of  Justice  (the  Hon.  Allan  Bristol  Aylesworth)  referred  to,  is 
in  his  Report  to  the  Governor-General  re  the  two  Ontario  statutes 
above  cited.  The  sentence  in  which  it  occurs  reads  as  follows: 
"The  legislation  in  question,  even  though  confiscation  of  property 
without  compensation,  and  so  an  abuse  of  legislative  power,  does  not 
fall  within  any  of  the  aforesaid  enumeration." 

I  rather  think  myself  that  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  has  also  here  in  his 
mind  the  passing  by  the  Governor-General  (in  spite  of  petitions  for 
Disallowance)  of  two  Acts  of  the  Ontario  Legislature  having  re- 
ference to  its  formation  of  a  so-called  Hydro-Electric  Commission 
for  the  transmission  of  electrical  power  to  municipalities,  viz. : 
"An  Act  to  Validate  certain  By-Laws  .  .  ."  etc.  (8  Edward  VII, 
Chapter  22);  and  "An  Act  to  Amend  an  Act  .  .  .  to  validate  certain 
contracts  ..."  etc.  (9  Edward  VII,  Chapter  19) ;  for  Mr.  Smith 
often  confounded  the  two  cases  both  in  speech  and  in  writing.  — 
In  the  latter  of  these  Acts  occur  the  words  "every  action  which  has 
been  heretofore  brought  and  is  now  pending  wherein  the  validity 
of  the  said  contract  ...  is  attacked  or  called  in  question  .  .  . 
shall  be  and  the  same  is  hereby  forever  stayed."  (See  the  columns 
of  the  [Toronto]  Financial  Post  and  of  the  [Toronto]  Canada  Law 
Journal  from  1907  to  1910.  —  Professor  A.  V.  Dicey's  Opinion  on 
both  questions,  which  Mr.  Smith  obtained,  will  be  found  in  the  last- 
named  periodical,  Volume  XLV,  Numbers  13  and  14,  pages  459, 
et  seq,  July,  1909.)  — Ed.] 


460  REMINISCENCES 

ployed  in  our  commercial  institutions.  Some  of  our 
best  citizens  took  part  in  the  enterprise.  But  the  com- 
mercial magnates,  who  had  a  special  interest  in  the 
scheme,  behaved  as,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  was  their  wont. 
The  Bank  of  Commerce  alone  lent  a  helping  hand. 
I  cannot  pretend  that  the  behaviour  of  the  young  men 
themselves  was  very  gallant,  or  that  they  stood  by 
those  who  were  struggling  and  spending  money  in  their 
interest  as  English  youths  would  have  done.  The 
Club  was  within  easy  walk  of  "The  Grange,"  and  I 
had  imagined  myself  strolling  thither  often  in  old  age 
and  looking  on  at  the  enjoyments  of  youth.  But  for 
my  best  efforts  wasted  and  a  large  outlay  of  money 
I  had  only  the  consolation  of  feeling  that  the  failure  was 
no  fault  of  mine. 

A  literary  field  Ontario  could  hardly  be,  walled  in 
as  she  was  by  the  French  Province  on  one  side,  on 
another  by  the  wilderness  which  bounds  her  to  the 
west,  and  to  the  south  by  the  United  States.  The 
literary  market  of  the  United  States,  in  spite  of  the 
identity  of  language,  is  separate.  A  little  popular 
History  of  the  United  States  1  written  by  me  had  some 
sale.  It  was  an  exception  which  proved  the  rule.  It 
had  the  advantage  of  being  written  by  a  neutral,  though 
one  who  knew  the  United  States  and  took  a  native's 
interest  in  their  story.  But  my  life  as  a  literary  man 


[l  "The  United  States:  An  Outline  of  Political  History;  1492- 
1871."  By  Goldwin  Smith,  D.C.L.  New  York  and  London: 
Macmillan.  1901.] 


MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA  461 

in  the  higher  sense  of  the  term  was  at  an  end.  My 
Oxford  dreams  of  literary  achievement  never  were  or 
could  be  fulfilled  in  Canada.  Canadians  who  seek 
literary  distinction,  as  some  have  done,  not  in  vain, 
go  to  England. 

The  University  question  was  one  in  which  I  naturally 
felt  great  interest.  While  the  University  of  Toronto, 
then  King's  College,  was  confined  to  Anglicans,  the 
other  churches  had  founded  separate  universities  for 
themselves.  When  that  barrier  was  thrown  down, 
Bishop  Strachan,1  a  masterful  but  wrong-headed  man, 
led  an  Anglican  secession  and  founded  Trinity.2  The 
resources  of  the  Province,  which,  especially  since  the 
enlargement  of  the  curriculum  by  the  inclusion  of 
science  were  not  more  than  sufficient  to  maintain  a 
single  university  on  a  proper  scale,  were  now  scattered 
among  half  a  dozen  bodies,  all  with  a  power  of  granting 
degrees.  Visiting  one  of  these,  I  found  a  staff  of  two 
teachers  besides  the  head,  a  library  containing  two 
bookcases,  one  full  of  common  school  books,  the  other 
of  Government  reports;  science  represented  by  a  few 
instruments  on  the  floor  of  a  hall;  and  a  museum 
represented  by  a  small  hortus  siccus,  and  some  geologi- 
cal specimens  scattered,  like  the  scientific  instruments, 
on  the  floor.  This  institution  was  empowered  to  grant 
degrees  in  all  the  subjects  of  human  knowledge.  I 

[l  The  Hon.  and  Right  Rev.  J.  Straehan,  born  at  Aberdeen,  1778 ; 
went  to  Canada  in  1799 ;  joined  the  Church  of  England ;  Executive 
Councillor,  1818;  first  Bishop  of  Toronto,  1840.  Died  1867.] 

[2  The  University  of  Trinity  College,  Toronto.] 


462  REMINISCENCES 

was  invited  to  speak  on  the  question  at  Trinity,  where 
I  pleaded  for  combination  of  resources  to  sustain  one 
worthy  university  and  advocated  the  religious  college 
in  a  secular  university  as  the  solution  of  that  part  of 
the  problem.  My  plea  was  well  received.  But  the 
Provost  of  Trinity  about  that  time  was  a  very  excellent 
man  transplanted  late  from  England,  who  seemed  to 
feel  that  he  was  in  an  alien  element  and  to  shrink  from 
closer  contact  with  it.  I  went  on  preaching  upon  the 
same  text,  though  Colonel,  afterwards  Sir  Casimir  Gzow- 
ski 1  came  to  my  aid,  seeing  that  great  opportunities  were 
being  missed  by  Canadian  youths  for  lack  of  a  good 
school  of  practical  science.  At  last  a  legacy  left  by 
Mr.  George  Gooderham  2  to  the  Methodist  University 
at  Cobourg  on  condition  of  its  migration  to  Toronto 
brought  about  that  in  favour  of  which  I  might  have 
preached  for  ever.  I  enjoyed  the  success,  although  the 
credit  was  not  mine. 

However,  in  the  main  the  true  policy  prevailed. 
The  chief  exception  was  Queen's  University  at  Kings- 

f1  Sir  Casimir  Stanislaus  Gzowski,  K.C.M.G.,  born  at  St.  Peters- 
burg in  1813,  a  son  of  Stanislaus,  Count  Gzowski.  Having  taken 
part  in  the  Polish  insurrection  of  1830-1831  he  was  after  imprison- 
ment shipped  to  America.  There  he  practised  law  in  Pennsylvania. 
In  1842  went  to  Canada ;  took  up  engineering  and  was  employed 
in  railway  construction  and  bridge  building.  Appointed  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  in  1873  ;  Honorary  A.D.C.  to  the  Queen,  1879.  Died  1898.] 

[2  George  Gooderham,  born  at  Scole,  Norfolk,  England,  in  1830 ; 
President  of  the  Gooderham  and  Worts  Distilling  Co. ;  of  the  Bank 
of  Toronto ;  of  the  Western  Canada  Loan  and  Savings  Co. ;  a 
Director  of  the  General  Hospital  (all  of  Toronto) ;  and  a  Governor 
of  the  University  of  Toronto.  Died  in  1905.] 


MY  LIFE  IN   CANADA  463 

ton,  the  Principal 1  of  which  perhaps  relieved  himself 
of  a  little  of  his  chagrin  by  a  critical  article  in  a  London 
Review.2  Reconcentration  was  accompanied  by  the 
admission  of  science  and  other  utilities.  The  exclu- 
sively classical  or  mathematical  University,  though  we 
may  venerate  its  memory,  is  a  thing  of  the  old  time 
and  the  old  world. 

Besides  the  part  I  took  in  the  foundation  of  the 
Athletic  Club,  I  was  President  for  some  years  of  a 
Lawn  Tennis  Club,  and  always  thought  it  right  to  do 
what  I  could  for  the  reasonable  encouragement  of 
sports,  not  forgetting  the  playing  fields  of  Eton,,  though 
it  may  be  questioned  whether  Waterloo  was  won  there. 
Reasonable  sports  are  good  for  moral  as  well  as  for 
physical  health.  But  I  hope  I  never  pandered  to  the 
dominant  craze  for  athletics,  of  which  I  am  afraid 
Oxford  and  Cambridge,  Universities  of  the  wealthy, 
were  the  birthplaces,  and  to  which  University  author- 
ities have  weakly  pandered,  betraying  thereby  their 
duty  to  their  students,  and  to  the  parents  of  those 
students,  who  sent  them,  perhaps  at  a  great  sacrifice, 


[J  The  Rev.  George  Monro  Grant,  born  at  the  Albion  Mines, 
N.S.,  1835 ;  Principal  of  Queen's  College,  Kingston,  Ont.,  Canada, 
from  1877  till  his  death  in  1902.] 

[2  "  Canada  and  the  Empire,"  by  G.  M.  Grant,  in  The  National 
Review  for  July,  1896.  No.  161.  Volume  XXVII,  pp.  673-685.  — 
Goldwin  Smith  published  "A  Reply"  in  The  Canadian  Magazine  of 
October,  1896.  Vol.  VII,  pages  540-544.  And  to  this  Principal 
Grant  answered  under  the  title  of  "Canada  and  the  Empire:  A 
Rejoinder  to  Dr.  Goldwin  Smith,"  in  The  Canadian  Magazine  of 
November,  1896.  Vol.  VIII,  pages  73-78.] 


464  REMINISCENCES 

to  the  University,  to  be  trained  for  intellectual  callings, 
not  for  those  of  porters  or  stevedores.  Mens  sana  in 
cor  pore  sano,  by  all  means;  but  sanies  means  healthy, 
not  muscular.  By  this  glorification  of  the  animal  we 
get  up  a  false  standard  of  merit  specially  misbecoming 
a  University.  The  same  man  can  rarely  be  an  athlete 
and  a  good  student,  since  it  is  from  the  same  fund  of 
nervous  energy  that  we  draw  for  the  work  of  the  body 
and  for  that  of  the  brain.  In  this  highly  commercial 
age,  when  success  in  life  means  success  in  making 
money,  University  training  has  its  detractors  who  tell 
you  that  an  office-boy  of  fourteen  is  worth  more  than 
a  University  graduate  of  four-and-twenty.  It  will  be 
difficult  to  answer  this  if  the  graduate  has  spent  his 
time  in  the  abnormal  development  of  his  muscles; 
otherwise  we  might  answer  the  commercial  detractor 
by  asking  what  it  is  that  he  means  by  'life.' 

3JC  *"(*  5JC  *J»  3JC  *|C  5yC 

My  wife's  name  on  the  tomb,1  my  joy  departed,  I 
still  did  not  want  to  spend  the  rest  of  my  days  in  idle 
gloom.  My  eyes  were  turned  to  Cornell,  one  of  the 
happiest  scenes  of  my  life.  I  was  still,  for  my  age, 
vigorous  and  able  to  hold  the  pen,  which,  not  the  sword 
or  the  spade,  had  been  my  instrument  of  labour.  At 
Cornell  a  new  building  of  the  University  had  been  called 
after  my  name,  and,  what  was  more  to  the  purpose, 
teaching  in  History  seemed  likely  to  be  of  special  use 
to  American  youth  in  the  coming  time.  I  might  have 

p  Mrs.  Goldwin  Smith  died  on  September  the  9th,  1909.] 


PHOTOGRAPH  OF  A  DEATH-MASK  OF  GOLDWIN  SMITH. 

Made  by  Mr.  Walter  S.  Allward,  of  Toronto,  on  June  the  ninth,  1910. 


MY  LIFE  IN  CANADA  465 

gone  down  to  my  grave  in  honour,  as  I  certainly  should 
in  peace. 

That  hope  was  suddenly  blighted,  that  door  to  a 
happy  and  perhaps  not  unfruitful  eld  age  and  exit, 
was  shut.1  I  received  a  shock  which  ruined  my  intel- 
lect, my  memory,  my  powers  as  a  teacher.  Without 
the  aid  of  a  first-rate  Secretary,  I  could  not  have 
stumbled  on  as  I  have  done. 

f1  He  is  referring  to  the  accident  by  which  he  broke  his  hip  on 
February  the  2d,  1910.] 


2H 


INDEX 


Aberdeen,  the  fourth  Earl  of,   185 ; 

206;    287. 

Abingdon,  the  sixth  Earl  of,  53. 
Acland,  Dr.  (afterwards  Sir  H.),  283. 
Adams,  Charles  Francis,  325  ;  327. 
Africa,  South,  war  in.     See  Boer  war. 
"African  Confessors,"    109. 
Agassiz,  372. 
Alabama,  the,  322. 

Albany,  H.  R.  H.  the  Duchess  of,  282. 
Albert,  Prince.     See  Prince  Consort, 

the. 

Alboni,  Marietta,  151. 
Alderson,  Georgina  Caroline,   164. 
Alpine  tours,  88 ;  387 
Althorp,  Lord,  69. 
Amalfi,  394. 
America,   Civil   War  in,   221;    238; 

319;      England's     attitude,     323; 

327,  328;    333-335;    339-340. 
Andersonville  prison-camp,  335. 
Annexation,  439,  et  seq.;  446. 
Anti-Corn-Law  League,  216;   256. 
Aram,  Eugene,  386. 
Arch,  Joseph,  13  ;  228. 
Archibald,  Adams  George,  416. 
Arnold,  Matthew,  70,  71 ;    151. 
Arnold,  Thomas,  67 ;   396. 
Arrivabene,  155. 

Ashburton,  the  second  Baron,  140. 
Ashburton,  Lady,  140,  et  seq. 
Astley's,  293. 
Athenaeum  Club,  the,  158. 
Athletic  Club,  the,  459,  460. 
Athletics,   367-368;    463-464. 
Aumale,  due  D',  146. 
"Aurora  Speech,"  Mr.  Blake's,  442, 

443. 

Autonomy  Bills,  the,  428. 
Awdry,  Sir  John,  107. 


Bacon,  John,  76. 
Bagley,  Sir  Thomas,  215. 


Ballinasloe  Horse  Fair,  309. 

Balliol  College,  99. 

Bancroft,  George,  332  ;   400,  401. 

Bar,  the,  129. 

Bayard,  Thomas  Francis,  401. 

Beaconsfield,  Earl  of.  See  Disraeli, 
Benjamin. 

"Bedgebury,"  163. 

Bellamy's  "Looking  Backward,"  230. 

Bentham,  289. 

Bentinck,  Lord  George,  176;  180, 
181;  183;  204;  264. 

Beresford-Hope,  Alexander  J.,  162 ; 
178. 

Bernard,  Mountague,  51. 

Bernhardt,  Sara,  151. 

Besant,  Mrs.  Annie,  80. 

Bethell,  Richard,  first  Baron  West- 
bury,  109. 

Biota,  93. 

Bismarck,  155;   164. 

Blake,  Edward,  442,  443;  his  char- 
acter, 444. 

Blanc,  Louis,  96 ;   155. 

Boardman,  Douglas,  378. 

Bodley,  Sir  Thomas,  148. 

Boer  War,  the,  211;  219;  448  et 
seq. 

Boston,  arrival  at,  328  et  seq. 

Boulton,  William  Henry,  450. 

Bourassa,  Henri,  427. 

Bouverie,  Edward  Playdell-,  111. 

Bowring,  Sir  John,  289. 

Brady  and  Tate,  4. 

Braham,  John,  145. 

Brain,  promise  to  bequeath,  378. 

Breton  (his  mother's  name),  5. 

Bridge,  400. 

Bright,  John,  174;  216;  218;  223; 
228,  229;  234;  his  oratory,  238 
et  seq.;  his  character,  239-240; 
256;  288;  320;  quoted,  358;  as 
an  orator,  405. 

British  Columbia,  420  et  seq. 

Brodrick,  G.  C.,  296. 

Brougham,   Lord,   25;    156;    229. 


467 


468 


INDEX 


Brown,  George,  character  of,  433  el 

seq.;    443;    453. 
Brown,  Gordon,  433. 
Bruno,  Giordano,  397. 
Bryan,  W.  J.,  404. 
Bryant,  W.  C.,  332. 
Buckland,  William,  67. 
Buffalo,  extinction   of  the,   418. 
Bulley,  Frederick,  51. 
Bulwer-Lytton,  first   Baron   Lytton, 

154. 

Burghley,  253. 
Burke,  Edmund,  300. 
Burke,  T.  H.,  301. 
Burns,  Mrs.     See  Crooks,  Miss. 
Burrard,  Sir  George,  274. 
Butler,     General    Ben,     339;      348; 

appearance    and    character,    349 ; 

anecdotes  of,  350. 
Butler's  "  Analogy,"  65. 
Bystander,  the,  448. 


Caen,  93. 

Cameron,  M.,  454. 

Camorra,  the,  392. 

Campbell,  John,  first  Baron,   157. 

Campbell  and  Stratheden,  Lord,  437. 

Camp  meetings,  376-377. 

Canada,  282 ;  English  ignorance  of, 
385  et  seq.;  the  North- West,  414 
et  seq.;  the  North- West  rebellion, 
411;  history  of,  424^25;  con- 
stitution of,  425 ;  confederation  of, 
425-426. 

"Canada  First,"  441  et  seq.;   453. 

Canada  Temperance  Act.  See  Scott 
Act. 

Canadian  Pacific  Railway,  418  et 
seq.;  421;  438. 

Canino,  Prince  de,  417. 

Canning,  Charles  John,  Earl,  161 ; 
183;  185;  203. 

Canning,  Sir  Stratford  (afterwards 
Lord  Stratford  de  Redcliffe),  287. 

Canterbury  (in  New  Zealand),  209. 

Carabas,  Marquis  of,  255. 

Cardwell,  Viscount,  161 ;  185  et  seq. ; 
202;  301-302. 

Carlingford,  Baron,  144. 

Carlisle,  the  seventh  Earl  of,  301. 

Carlyle,  Mrs.,  142. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  141;  167;  331; 
358. 


Caroline,  Queen,  157. 

Carthusian  Monastery,  388. 

Cartwright,  Sir  Richard,  438. 

Cascadilla,  374. 

Cashel  steeplechases,  309. 

Catholic  emancipation,  252. 

Catholicism,  Roman,  397. 

Catholics  and  Protestants,  war  be- 
tween, 308. 

Cavendish,  Lord  F.  C.,  301. 

Cayuga  Lake,  374-375. 

Cecil,  Lady,  M.  A.  C.  H.,  163. 

Cecil,  Lord  Robert.  See  Salisbury, 
third  Marquess  of. 

Chamberlain,  Joseph,  210. 

Charities,  Civic,  456,  457. 

Chartists,  the,  292,  293. 

Chase,  S.  P.,  338. 

Cheese  fair  at  Reading,  10. 

Chesson,  F.  W.,  362. 

Chevening,  Lord  Stanhope's  seat, 
147. 

Chimney-sweeps,  9. 

Chin,  William,  453. 

Chinese  War.     See  Lorcha  War. 

Christian  Socialists,  361. 

Christmas  festivities,  7,  8. 

Churchill,  Lord  Randolph,  173. 

Circuits,  123. 

Civil  War,  the,  in  America.  See 
America,  Civil  War  in. 

Clarke,  E.  F.,  444. 

Clerical  tests,  effect  of  removal  of, 
381,  382. 

Clive,  Lord,  282. 

Clough,  Arthur  Hugh,  72,  73. 

Clubs,  observations  on,  158. 

Clumber,  191. 

Cobalt  Lake  Mining  Co.,  case  of, 
458. 

Cobden,  Richard,  174;  216,  217; 
223  ;  228,  229  ;  232  ;  his  character 
and  temperament,  242-243 ;  his 
style,  243  ;  the  French  treaty,  247  ; 
quoted,  248 ;  burial  place  of,  250 ; 
256 ;  quoted,  261 ;  his  attack  on 
Peel,  261 ;  his  letter  to  Peel,  265 ; 
320. 

Cockburn,  Lord  Chief  Justice,  124 ; 
359. 

Coercion  Bills,  265;    268;    316. 

Coleridge,  Edward,  40 ;   201. 

Coleridge,  John  Duke,  first  Baron, 
47;  107;  110. 


INDEX 


469 


Coleridge,  Sir  John,  116;    123. 

College,  the,  at  Eton,  39. 

Colonial  question,  the,  169-170  ;  210  ; 
221-222  ;  245  ;  424-425  ;  439  ;  454. 

Commissions,  the  University,  (i)  the 
Commission  of  Inquiry,  98  et  seq.; 
names  of  the  Commissioners,  101 
et  seq.;  (ii)  the  Executive  Com- 
mission, 107  et  seq.;  the  names  of 
the  Commissioners,  107  et  seq.; 
signing  of  the  document,  1 12  et  seq. 

Common  Room  Society,  282. 

Competition-wallahs,  309. 

Comyn,  Patrick.  See  Cummin,  Pat- 
rick. 

Conde,  Prince  de,  160. 

Congreve,  Richard,  51. 

"Coningsby,"  162. 

Conington,  John,  52,  86. 

Cook,  John  Douglas,  162  ;   165. 

Cooper,  James,  453. 

Cope,  Sir  John,  16  ;   20. 

"Copenhagen"  (Wellington's  horse), 
24. 

Cornell,  Ezra,  366-370. 

Cornell  University,  367  et  seq.;  ar- 
rival at,  371 ;  site  of,  ib. ;  lectures 
at,  399 ;  hopes  of  revisiting,  464. 

Corn  laws,  the,  252 ;  260.  See  also 
Manchester  school,  the. 

Corson,  Professor  Hiram,  378. 

Cory,  W.  J.     See  Johnson,  William. 

Cosmos  Club,  the,  400. 

Courts  of  law,  English,  124. 

Coxe,  H.  O.,  279. 

Cradock,  E.  H.,  280. 

Cradock,  Mrs.,  280. 

Cranworth,  Baron,  313. 

Craufurds,  the,  159-160. 

Crimean  War,  the,  195 ;     219 ;     287. 

Criminal  cases,  appeal  in,  125. 

Croker,  John  Wilson,  137. 

Crooks,  Miss,  391. 

Crowder,  R.  B.,  124. 

Cummin,  Patrick,  150. 

Currency,  paper,  337. 

Curtis,  G.  W.,  372 ;  402. 

Czar,  Nicholas  I.     See  Nicholas  I. 


D 


Daily  News,  The,  168 ;    170. 
Dalhousie,    first    Marquess   of,    185 ; 
205. 


Dampier,  John  Lucius,  101. 

Dana,  Charles,  413. 

Darwin's  theories,  373. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  194 ;     324 ;     355. 

Deer-shooting,  20. 

Delane,  J.  T.,  232  ;   292. 

Democracy,    225;     233;     American, 

seamy  side  of,  402. 
Demys,  the,  of  Magdalen,  52. 
Denison,   J.  E.     See  Ossington,  first 

Viscount. 
Denison,  J.  E.,  Viscount   Ossington, 

192. 

Denmark,  Crown  Prince  of,  283. 
Derby,  fourteenth  Earl  of,  106  ;   180  • 

255;    267. 

Desmond,  Countess  of,  108. 
Devrient,  152. 
Dickens,  Charles,  154. 
Disestablishment,  196 ;   224. 
Disraeli,  Benjamin,  106;    148;    155; 

161-162;      164;      168;      170-171; 

175  et  seq.;   178-182;  as  a  speaker, 

179;     his    "Life   of   Lord    George 

Bentinck,"  181;    194;    198;    202; 

his   letter   tc    Peel,    212-213;     his 

speech  on  Peel's  reference  to  this 

letter,  ib.;    his  political  character, 

255;   264;   310. 
Dixon,  B.  Homer,  5. 
Dixon,  Harriette  E.  M.     See  Smith, 

Mrs.  Goldwin. 
Douro,  Lady,  23. 
Dow,  Neal,  447. 
Dresden,  90. 

Drummond,  Edward,  263. 
Duff,  James  Grant,  147. 
Dufferin,  the  first  Marquess  of,  458. 
Dukinfield,    Sir   Henry   Robert,    12; 

159. 

Dukinfield,  John  Lloyd,  12. 
Dukinfield,     Katherine,      afterwards 

Mrs.  R.  P.  Smith,  12. 
Dukinfield,  Lady,  159. 
Dukinfield,  Sir  Nathaniel,  12. 
Dundas,  Sir  David,  134. 
Durham,  Lord,  429. 


E 


Edlund,  R.  C.,  409. 

Education   Commission,  1 16 ;    names 

of  Commissioners,  ib. 
Education,  State-aided,  231. 


470 


INDEX 


Edward  VII,  King,  191 ;  281. 

Electioneering,  294. 

Elections,  anecdotes  of,  296-297. 

Elections  of  1886,  G.  S.'s  share  in, 
298-299. 

Elgin,  the  eighth  Earl,  204;  219; 
289;  425;  428. 

Ellesmere,  the  second  Earl  of,  107. 

Emerson,  331. 

"Empire,  The,"  168;    170. 

Engleheart,  Sir  J.  Gardner  D.,  131. 

"Essays  and  Reviews,"  72. 

Eton,  life  at,  35 ;  masters  at,  40 ; 
religion  at,  42  ;  boys,  character  of, 
42;  beauty  of,  48. 

Eveleigh,  John,  99. 

Everett,  Edward,  66 ;  platform  ora- 
tory of,  405. 

Eyre,  Governor,  189,  225;   357. 


F 


Factory,  the,  and  its  influences,  327, 

328. 

Factory  Acts,  229. 
Factory  system,  the,  363. 
Fagging  (at  Eton),  35. 
Falaise,  93. 

"Family  Compact,"  the,  452. 
Family  likenesses,  329. 
Farmers,  sixty  years  ago,  14. 
Farrer,  the  first  Baron,  47. 
Faucit,  Helen,  151. 
Fearne,  Charles,  121. 
Fellows  of  Colleges,  75. 
Fellowships  of  Magdalen,  73. 
Fiske,  Daniel  Willard,  370;  398. 
Florence,  388 ;  398. 
Florence  Mining  Co.,  case  of,  458. 
Forbes,  J.  M.,  321 ;   330. 
Forbury,  the,  at  Reading,  10. 
Forster,  W.  E.,  316,  317. 
Foster,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Chas.  Colley, 

450. 

Foster,  W.  A.,  442. 
Fox-hunting,  sixty  years  ago,  20. 
Fraser,  James,  Bishop  of  Manchester, 

15;  20;  119. 

Freeman,  E.  A.,  20 ;    70-71 ;    277. 
Free    trade,     183;     216-217;     246; 

256-257;   269;  445. 
French     Emperor.       See     Napoleon 

III. 
Friar  Street,  Reading,  5. 


Froude,   James  Anthony,   72;    167; 

175. 
Frowd,  J.  B.,  279. 


G 


Gaisford,  Dean,  50. 

Garibaldi,  155;  220. 

Garrison,  W.  L.,  334. 

George  IV,  316. 

Gladstone,  W.  E.,  38;  101;  105; 
161;  179;  185;  193;  his  advo- 
cacy of  the  cause  of  the  oppressed, 
194  ;  hie  attitude  on  the  American 
civil  war,  194-195 ;  his  attitude 
on  the  Crimean  War,  195 ;  his 
character,  ib. ;  his  disposition,  197 ; 
his  attitude  on  the  Irish  question, 
197;  as  a  statesman,  ib.;  as  a 
speaker,  198  ;  his  versatility,  199  ; 
his  classical  studies,  ib. ;  his  writ- 
ings, ib. ;  his  Homeric  theories, 
ib. ;  his  appearance,  200 ;  203 ; 
234-236;  284-285;  294;  310; 
317 ;  324  ;  as  an  orator,  405. 

Gladstone,  Mrs.,  200. 

Globe,  The  [Toronto],  433,  434 ;  443. 

Godkin,  E.  L.,  413. 

Godley,  J.  R.,  169 ;  209. 

Goldwin  Smith  Hall,  379. 

Goldwin,  Mr.  (G.  S.'s  mother's 
uncle),  5. 

Goodall,  Joseph,  43. 

Gooderham,  George,  462. 

Good  Friday,  8. 

Gordon,  William,  358. 

Graham,  Sir  John  R.  G.,  180 ;  185 ; 
205. 

"Grammar  of  Assent,"  the,  62. 

"Grange,  The"  (Lord  Ashburton's 
House),  140. 

"Grange,  The"  (Goldwin  Smith's 
House),  450  et  seq. 

Grant,  General  U.  S.,  135;  339; 
his  character,  342  et  seq.;  hia 
failure  as  President,  343. 

Grant,  Rev.  G.  M.,  463. 

Granville,  the  second  Earl,  208. 

Greek  Letter  Societies,  368. 

Gregory,  Walter  D.,  448. 

Gregory,  Sir  William,  168. 

Greville's  "Memoirs,"  175;  183; 
200. 

Grey,  the  third  Earl,  212. 


INDEX 


471 


Griffith,  Moses,  279. 

Grisi,  152. 

Grote,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  George,  147. 

Guizot,  25 ;   94. 

Gully,  J.  M.,  384. 

Guy  Fawkes's  Day,  10. 

Gzowski,  Sir  Casimir,  462. 


II 


Hallam,  Arthur,  136. 

Hallam,  Henry,  47 ;   136. 

"Hamlet,"  152. 

Hampden,  Renn  Dickson,  143. 

"  Handbook  of  Commercial  Union," 

445. 

Hannibal,  395. 
Hanover,  travels  in,  91. 
Harcourt,  Sir  W.  G.  G.  Vernon,  163 ; 

281. 

Hardinge,  the  second  Viscount,  178. 
Hardy,  Gathorne,  276. 
Hare,  Augustus  J.  C.,  396. 

Harper,  the  Reverend ,  14. 

Harrowby,  the  second   Earl   of,    107. 
Hastings,  Warren,  Life  of,  167. 
Haultain,  T.  Arnold,  379. 
Hawtrey,  E.  C.,  43,  44. 
Hayward,  Abraham,  148. 
Head,  Sir  Edmund  Walker,  434. 
Hemming,  G.  W.,  163. 
Herald,  the  New  York,  283. 
Herbert,    Sidney,    161;     176;     185; 

202;   260;   291. 

Hertford,  third  Marquess  of,  137 ;  179. 
Hewson,  General  Butt,  432. 
Heydukoff,  H.,  34. 
Heywood,  James,  100. 
Hincks,  Sir  F.,  437. 
Hinds,  Samuel,  101. 
Hodgson,  Francis,  43. 
Home,  Daniel  Dunglas,  384. 
Home  Rule,   196;    234;    241;    245; 

270;    285;    294;    298;    305;    317; 

444,  445. 

Hook,  Theodore,  134. 
Hooker,  Gen.  Joseph,  347. 
Hooker,  Richard,  79. 
Hope,  Alexander  J.  Beresford.     See 

Beresford-Hope. 
Hope,  Thomas,  162. 
Hopkins,  J.  Castell,  quoted,  422. 
Horsman,  Edward,  178. 
Hospitals,  military,  335 ;  352. 


Houghton  (Monckton  Milnes),  Lord, 

135. 

House  of  Commons,  speeches  in,  150. 
House  of  Lords,  226. 
Household,  his  father's,  29. 
Howe,  Joseph,  436  et  seq. 
Howland,  W.  H.,  442. 
Howley,  Archbishop,  58. 
Hughes,  Thomas,  209  ;   361. 
Hunter,  Sir  Paul,  175. 
Huntington,  Lucius  Seth,  438. 
Huntley  and  Palmer,  2. 
Huxley,  T.  H.,  199  ;   138. 


Imperial  Federation,  222 ;  427. 
Indian  Mutiny,  the,  203. 
Inglis,  Sir  R.  H.,  132. 
Inglis,  Rev.  Wm.,  433. 
Ionian  Isles,  cession  of,  168. 
Ireland,  visits  to,  301 ;  its  beauty  and 

its   people,    302 ;     crime   in,    306 ; 

clergy  in,  307  et  seq. ;  constabulary 

of,    308;     second    visit    to,    313; 

neglect  of,  by  Royalty,  314  et  seq. 
Irish,  character  of  the,  303. 
"Irish  History  and  Irish  Character," 

Mr.  G.  S.'s  book  on,  235;    304. 
Irish  question,  the.     See  Home  Rule. 
Italians,  cruelty  of,  to  animals,  393. 
Italy,   early  travels  in,   95 ;    second 

visit  to,  391. 
Ithaca,  first  visit  to,  371 ;  life  at,  374, 

375;    inhabitants  of,  377,  407. 


Jackson,  Andrew,  333  ;  399. 
Jamaica,  outbreak  in,  357 ;   floggings 

in,  357 ;   committee,  359. 
James  I,  King,  284. 
Japan,  military  power  of,  423. 
Jelf,  W.  E.,  66. 
Jenkyns.  Richard,  99. 
Jerome  Bonaparte,  24. 
Jesuits'  Estate  Bill,  429. 
Jeune,  Francis  (afterwards  Lord  St. 

Helier),  101;    102. 
"Jingoism,"  219. 
John  of  Nepomuk,  Saint,  80. 
Johnson,  Andrew,  349. 
Johnson,    George  Henry  Sacheverell, 

101;    104. 


472 


INDEX 


Johnson,  William  (afterwards  Cory), 

47. 

Jones,  Mrs.,  of  Pantglas,  290. 
Jowett,  Benjamin,  83  ;    100 ;    195. 
Judges,  their  responsibility,   127-128. 
"Junius,"  109. 


K 


Kean,  Charles,  152-153. 

Keate,  John,  40. 

Keble,  John,  64. 

Kell,  Robert  and  Samuel,  326 ;    363. 

Kinglake,  A.  W.,  245. 

Kingsley,  Charles,  20 ;  358. 

Knaresborough,  385-386. 

Ku-Klux,  the,  321. 


Labouchere,  195. 

Labourers  (agricultural),  sixty  years 
ago,  14. 

Lake,  William  Charles,  116;   117. 

Landor,  Walter  Savage,  398. 

Lansdowne,  Lord,  408  ;   444. 

Lawn  Tennis  Club,  463. 

Lawrence,  Mrs.  Bigelow,  141. 

Lawrence,  Sir  John,  309. 

Layard,  A.  H.,  170. 

Leader,  the,  435. 

Lee,  General  Robert  Edward,  341 ;  his 
character,  347 ;  as  a  soldier,  348. 

Le  Marchant,  Denis,  156. 

Leo  XIII,  Pope,  393. 

Leopold,  Prince,  160  ;   282. 

"Letters  of  Runnymede,"  161 ;  178  ; 
179. 

Lewis,  Sir  George  Cornewall,  107 ; 
108;  199. 

Lewis,  John,  quoted,  443. 

Liberal,  the  [Toronto],  443. 

Liddell,  H.  G.,  101 ;    103. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  320 ;  321 ;  334  ; 
second  election  of,  336 ;  his  ig- 
norance of  money  matters,  338 ; 
340 ;  his  character  and  appearance, 
354  et  seq. ;  as  a  statesman,  355. 

Lincoln's  Inn,  121. 

Lind,  Jenny,  82  ;    151 ;   152. 

Lindsey,  Charles,  Goldwin  Smith's 
letter  to,  453. 

Lindsey,  George  G.  S.,  454. 

Linwood,  W.,  52. 


Literature,    Canada    as    a    field    for, 

460. 

Littlemore,  61. 
Liverpool,  Earl  of,  324. 
London,  life  in,  132  et  seq. 
Longfellow,  H.  W.,  331. 
Longley,  C.  T.,  Archbishop,  107. 
Long  Marston,  5. 
Lorcha  War,  288. 
Loring,  Charles,  328. 
"Lothair,"  quotation  from,  171 ;  182. 
Louis  Napoleon.     See  Napoleon  III. 
Lowe,  Mrs.,  312. 
Lowe,   Robert    (afterwards  Viscount 

Sherbrooke) ,  309  ;   appearance  and 

character,  311 ;    as  a  talker,  311 ; 

anecdotes  of,  311  et  seq. 
Lowell,  J.  R.,  332  ;   372. 
Loyal  and  Patriotic  Union,  the,  409  ; 

444. 

Lushington,  Stephen,  158. 
Lyndhurst,  Baron,  156. 
Lyons,  Admiral  Lord,  28  ;   290. 
Lyons,  the  first  Earl,  353. 
Lyttleton,  the  fourth  Baron,  199. 
Lytton,  Bulwer.     See  Bulwer. 


M 


Macaulay,  132;    167;   quoted,  397. 

"  Macbeth,"  153. 

Macdonald,   Sir  John  A.,  341 ;    430 

et  seq.;   434. 

Macdonald,  John  Sandfield,  436. 
Mackenzie,     Alexander,     435 ;      his 

character,  manner,  and  work,  436. 
Maffia,  the,  391,  392. 
Magdalen   College,   51 ;    Fellows  of, 

55;   revisited,  381. 
Mail,  the  [Toronto],  435. 
Maine,  Sir  Henry,  163. 
Malmesbury,  third  Earl  of,  168. 
Manchester  School,  the,   174;    215; 

its  creed,  220;    287. 
Manners,  Lord  John  (sixth  Duke  of 

Rutland),  162. 
Manning,  Henry  Edward,    Cardinal, 

62. 

Mario,  152. 
Marx,  Karl,  327. 
Maule,  William  Henry,  128. 
Maurice,  Frederick  Denison,  362. 
May  Day,  9. 
Maynooth,  304 ;   308. 


INDEX 


473 


Mazzini,  Giuseppe,  96  ;    155. 
McDonnell,  Sir  Alexander,  202  ;   304. 
McMullen,  John  Mercier,  433. 
Meade,  Gen.  George  Gordon,  347. 
Melbourne,  Lord,  46. 
Memory,  remarks  on,  34. 
Mennonites,  417. 
Merchant  Shipping  Act,  188. 
Metcalfe,  Lord,  425. 
Metternich,  Prince,  87. 
Miall,  Edward,  116-120. 
Middleton,  General,  411 ;  455. 
Mill,  John  Stuart,  359  ;   360. 
Milman,  Henry  Hart,  4  ;    136  ;    199. 
Milnes,    Monckton.     See   Houghton, 

Lord. 

Milton,  John,  240. 
Miracles,  394. 
Mitchell,  Colonel,  178. 
Mitford,  Miss,  25. 
Monkton  Farley  (or  Farleigh),  32. 
Moriarty,  Bishop,  308. 
Morley,  Viscount,  194 ;    his  portrait 

of  Cobden,  242  ;  quoted,  259  ;  261; 

264;    270. 

Morning  Chronicle,  the,  161. 
Morny,  due  DE,  146. 
Morris,  John  Brande,  65. 
Mortimer  House,  13  ;   272  ;   380. 
Mortimer  Parish,  13. 
Mouat,  J.  G.,  446. 
Mowbray,  Sir  John,  27 ;  380. 
Mozley,  James,  56. 
Muller,  Max,  272  ;    276. 
Mummers,  7. 

Mundella,  A.  J.,  172  ;  294-295. 
Murat,  393. 
Murchison,  Sir  Roderick  Impey,  29  ; 

67  ;    138  et  seq. ;   288. 
Mutiny,     the     Indian.     See     Indian 

Mutiny,  the. 

N 

Naples,  392. 

Napoleon   Bonaparte,    likenesses    of, 

24 ;   appearance  of,  ib. 
Napoleon  III,  155;  220;   247;  287; 

289;    291;    325. 
Nation,  The  New  York,  413. 
Nation,  The  [Toronto],  443. 
Naushon,  330. 
Neale,  Sir  H.  B.,  273. 
New  Year's  Day,  8. 


Newcastle,  the  fourth  Duke  of,  37. 
Newcastle,   the  fifth   Duke   of,    106; 

116;    119;    161;    176;    185;    201; 

291. 

Newman,  Francis,  61. 
Newman,  John  Henry,  Cardinal,  61 ; 

167. 

Newman,  Thomas  Harding,  60. 
"Newmanism,"  80;   382. 
Newspaper    reporter,     anecdote     of, 

333. 

Niagara,  Cobden's  remark  on,  224. 
Nicholas  I,  Czar,  139 ;    287. 
Normandy,  tour  in,  92. 
Norton,  Charles  Eliot,  329. 
Notarbartolo,  391. 
Noyes,  J.  H.,  375. 


O 


O'Brien,  William,  409. 

O'Connell,  Daniel,  178  ;   264. 

Odessa,  siege  of,  291. 

O'Hagan,  first  Baron,  202  ;  304  ;  313. 

O'Leary,  Arthur,  313. 

Oneida  Community,  the,  375-376. 

Opera,  the,  151. 

Oratory,  English  and  American,  405 ; 
Parliamentary,  149. 

Oriel  College,  99. 

Oronyatekha,  283. 

Osier,  Professor,  272. 

Ossington,  first  Viscount,  149. 

Oxford  (the  University),  life  at,  52- 
53;  before  reform,  67;  98-99; 
the  curriculum,  68  ;  undergraduate 
life  at,  69;  after  reform,  113-114; 
society  at,  275  ;  revisited,  380-381. 

Oxford  (the  University),  the  Com- 
mission of  Inquiry  and  the  Ex- 
ecutive Commission.  See  under 
Commissions,  the  University. 

Oxford  University  Bill  of  1854,  105 ; 
106-107. 

Oxoniensis,  letters  of,  101. 

Owen,  Robert,  376. 

Owen,  Sir  Richard,  138. 


Pakington,  J.  S.,  166. 
Palermo,  391. 
Palizzolo,  392. 
Palmer,  Fyshe,  2. 


474 


INDEX 


Palmer,  Roundel.  See  Selborne,  first 
Earl  of,  55. 

Palmer,  William,  56. 

Palmerston,  Lord,  166;  170;  218; 
224;  266;  284;  288;  289;  324. 

Paris,  comte  DE,  146. 

Parke,  Sir  James,  123. 

Parker,  Charles  Stuart,  177-205. 

Parliament.     See  House  of  Commons. 

Parnell,  316. 

Parr,  Samuel,  53. 

Parr,  Thomas,  108. 

Parsons,  hunting,  19. 

Parsons,  sixty  years  ago,  14. 

Party  system,  the,  299;  410;  in 
America,  334 ;  in  Canada,  425. 

Pasquale,  Villari,  398. 

Patrons  of   Industry,   the,   447. 

Pattison,  Mark,  84;    85;    100;    278. 

Pearson,  Mrs.,  290. 

Peel,  Sir  Robert,  161;  174;  175; 
180;  194;  203-205;  207;  speech 
referring  to  Disraeli's  request  for 
place,  213  ;  248-249 ;  burial  place 
of,  250 ;  political  character,  250- 
251 ;  255 ;  256  et  seq. ;  financial 
policy,  260 ;  attitude  of  leaders 
of  Corn  Law  League  towards,  262  ; 
and  Cobden,  quarrel  between,  262- 
263  ;  character  of,  264  ;  and  Cob- 
den,  reconciliation  of,  265;  317. 

Peelites,  the,  185  ;  200 ;  287. 

Pell,  J.  E.,  456. 

Penjdeh  incident,  408. 

Pension  system,  the  Army,  403—404. 

Pensions  Arrears  Bill,  403. 

Perugia,  95. 

Peter  the  Great,  231. 

Phelps,  Samuel,  153. 

Phoenix  Park,  301 ;  314 ;  315. 

Pigott,  E.  F.  Smyth,  150 ;    154. 

Playdell-Bouverie.     See  Bouverie. 

Plumptre,  Frederick  Charles,  41. 

Plunket,  first  Baron,  208. 

Poe,  Edgar  Allan,  332. 

Pompeii,  387. 

"Pop"  at  Eton,  38. 

"Popanilla."  See  "Voyage  of  Cap- 
tain Popanilla." 

Pope,  Joseph,  435. 

Portland,  the  fifth  Duke  of,  192. 

Potter,  Thomas  Bayley,  257;  322; 
326. 

Powell,  Baden,  101. 


Prague,  80. 

Prairie,  the,  415. 

President,  the,  of  the  United  States, 

a  presentation  to,  402. 
Prince  Consort,  the,  45 ;     181 ;    281 ; 

324. 

Prince  Imperial,  the,  291. 
Prince    of    Wales    (afterwards    King 

Edward  VII),  315. 
Pritchards,  a  Welsh  family,  5. 
Property,  private  ownership  of,  232. 
Protection,  183  ;    185  ;   217. 
Proudhon,  232. 
Psi  Upsilon  Society,  370. 
Public  School,  the,  influence  of,  119- 

120. 

Pullman,  327. 
Pusey,  E.  B.,  62. 
Pym,  John,  240 ;   250. 


Quakerism,  240-241. 
Quarterly  Review,  quoted,  345. 
Quebec,  destiny  of,  426,  427. 

R 

Rachel,  151. 

Railway,  the  Great  Western,  280. 

Ravenna,  95;   390-391. 

Reade,  Charles,  56. 

Reading  (the  town),  1-11 ;  380. 

Reading  parties  in  the  long  vacation, 

69. 

Rebellion,  Canadian  Northwest,  455. 
Reed,  Thomas  Brackett,  404. 
Reform  Bill  (of  1832),   10,  11 ;    225. 
Reid,  Wemyss,  211. 
"Relations     between    America    and 

England,  The,"  409. 
Reporters,  newspaper,  411. 
Richardson,  C.  Gordon,  446. 
Richmond,   George,   portrait-painter, 

159. 

Riel,  Louis,  411;  455. 
Ring,  Dr.,  7. 
Rintoul,  R.  S.,  165. 
Ristori,  150. 
Riviere,  Briton,  131. 
Robert  the  Devil,  93. 
Rockingham,  300. 
Rocky  Mountains,  the,  420. 
Roebuck,  J.  A.,  172 ;   208 :   294. 


INDEX 


475 


Rogers,  Sir  Frederic,  169,  209. 

Rogers,  J.  E.  T.,  84 ;  277. 

Rogers,  Samuel,  133. 

Rogers,  William,  117. 

Rolleston,  George,  277. 

Rome,  Classic  and  Modern,  395. 

Rosebery,  the  fifth  Earl  of,  209. 

Routh,  Martin,  51 ;   53  ;  381. 

Ruloff,  386. 

Ruskin,  358 ;  389. 

Russell,  Alexander,  204. 

Russell,  Dr.  Charles  William,  202; 
304;  307. 

Russell,  Sir  Henry,  26. 

Russell,  Lady,  of  Swallowfield,  365. 

Russell,  Lady  (wife  of  Lord  John 
Russell),  198. 

Russell,  Lord  John  (first  Earl  Rus- 
sell), 24,  25;  100;  106;  133;  179; 
207;  225;  266;  325. 


S 


Sackville-West,  Mortimer,  first  Baron, 

148. 

Sadleir,  John,  187. 
Sadler's  Wells,  152. 
Saffi,  Count  Aurelio,  96 ;   155. 
Sage,  Henry  W.,  378. 
Saint  George's  Chapel,  funeral  at,  46. 
Saint  Lawrence's  Church,  Reading,  2. 
Saint  Mary's,  Parish  of,  4. 
Saint  Peter's  (Rome),  396-397. 
Salisbury,   third    Marquess   of,    163 ; 

178-179;   322;   329. 
Saltaire,  327. 

Sandars,  Thomas  Collett,  163. 
Saturday  Review,  The,  162 ;    dinners, 

165;    272. 
School  life,  32. 
Schoolmates,  33. 
Scott  Act,  the,  447. 
Scott,  Rev.  William,  163. 
Seances,  spiritualistic,  382-383. 
Secession,  319. 
Sedgwick,  Adam,  67. 
Selborne,  first  Earl  of,  59  ;   198 ;  241. 
Sellar,  A.  C.,  295. 
Senate,  the  United  States,  404. 
Seneca  Lake,  374-375. 
Senior,  Nassau  William,  116-117. 
Seward,  William  Henry,  353. 
Shaftesbury,  the  eighth  Earl  of,  204 ; 

284. 


Sheffield,  elections  at,  172-173,  294- 
295. 

Sherbrooke,  Viscount.  See  Lowe, 
Robert. 

Sheridan,  341. 

Sherman,  General,  341 ;  345. 

Silchester,  13. 

Simcoe,  John  Graves,  452. 

Simpson,  Professor,  304. 

Skye  Crofters,  417. 

Slavery,  319  et  seq.;   334. 

Smith,  Arthur,  death  of,  6 ;  38. 

Smith,  Assheton,  17. 

Smith,  Goldwin,  boyhood,  1  et  seq.; 
goes  to  school  at  Monkton  Farley, 
32 ;  goes  to  Eton,  35 ;  leaves  Eton, 
49  ;  matriculates,  50 ;  enters  Mag- 
dalen College,  51 ;  takes  first-class 
honours,  68  ;  leaves  Magdalen,  73  ; 
tutor  of  University  College,  77 ; 
travels  on  the  Continent,  88  et  seq.  ; 
visits  Switzerland,  ib.;  the  Tyrol, 
ib.,  et  seq.;  spends  a  summer  at 
Dresden,  90;  visits  Prague,  ib.; 
visits  Hanover,  91 ;  takes  a  car- 
riage drive  through  Normandy, 
92  et  seq. ;  visits  Caen,  93 ;  visits 
Falaise,  ib. ;  meets  Guizot,  94 ; 
visits  Italy,  95 ;  at  Rome,  ib. ;  at 
Ravenna,  ib.;  at  Perugia,  ib.; 
at  Venice,  ib.,  96 ;  Assistant  Secre- 
tary to  the  University  Commission 
of  Inquiry,  102 ;  Secretary  to  the 
Commission  of  Reform,  107 ; 
Member  of  the  Education  Com- 
mission, 116;  studies  Law,  121; 
goes  on  Circuit,  123 ;  social  life 
in  London,  132  et  seq.;  joins  the 
Saturday  Review,  162 ;  appointed 
to  the  Regius  Professorship  of 
Modern  History  at  Oxford,  272; 
settles  at  Oxford,  ib. ;  opposes  the 
Great  Western  Railway,  280,  281 ; 
takes  part  in  elections,  294  et  seq.; 
visits  Ireland  (1862),  301  et  seq.; 
(1881),  313  et  seq.;  speaks  on 
behalf  of  the  North  at  Manchester, 
322 ;  visits  America,  327 ;  visits 
Washington,  352 ;  meets  Lincoln, 
354 ;  resigns  the  Oxford  Professor- 
ship, 365 ;  lives  at  Mortimer,  ib. ; 
meets  Andrew  White,  366 ;  arrives 
at  Cornell  University,  371 ;  visits 
the  Oneida  Community,  375 ; 


476 


INDEX 


attends  a  camp  meeting,  376 ; 
revisits  England,  380  et  seq. ;  visits 
Italy,  387  et  seq. ;  at  Venice,  389 ; 
at  Ravenna,  390 ;  second  visit  to 
Italy,  391  et  seq.;  visits  Sicily,  391 ; 
at  Naples,  392 ;  at  Pizzo,  393  ;  at 
Amain,  394 ;  at  Capua,  395 ;  at 
Rome,  396 ;  revisits  Washington, 
399  et  seq.;  visits  the  Northwest 
Territories  of  Canada,  414  et  seq.; 
at  Winnipeg,  416 ;  visits  the  Skye 
Crofters,  417 ;  forms  the  Loyal 
and  Patriotic  Union,  444 ;  joins 
the  "Reciprocity"  movement,  446, 
takes  part  in  the  Liberal  Tem- 
perance Campaign,  446,  447 ; 
settles  in  Canada  (1871),  450; 
marriage,  ib. ;  defends  General 
Middleton,  455,  456 ;  interests 
himself  in  civic  charities,  456 ; 
founds  the  Athletic  Club,  459; 
460 ;  advocates  university  cen- 
tralization, 461  et  seq.;  patronizes 
athletics,  463  ;  his  accident,  466. 

Smith,  Mrs.  Goldwin,  450 ;  death  of, 
464. 

Smith,  Henry,  276. 

Smith,  Dr.  Richard  Pritchard  (Gold- 
win  Smith's  father),  his  second 
marriage,  12 ;  retires,  13 ;  death 
of,  365. 

Smith,  Mrs.  R.  P.  (Goldwin  Smith's 
mother),  death  of,  6. 

Smith,  Sydney,  134 ;   136. 

Smoking,  21. 

Socialism,  228-229. 

Society,  rural,  sixty  years  ago,  15, 
16. 

Soult,  Marshal,  45. 

South  African  War.  See  Boer 
War. 

Spectator,  The,  165. 

Spence,  James,  320. 

Spencer,  Bishop,  58. 

Spencer,  Herbert,  139,  140. 

Spiritualism,  383  et  seq. 

Spithead,  274. 

Sports.     See  Athletics. 

Sprague,  Professor  and  Mrs.,  375. 

Squires,  sixty  years  ago,  15. 

St.  Helier,  Lord.  See  Jeune,  Fran- 
cis. 

Stanhope,  the  fifth  Earl,  133  ;  146  ; 
156. 


Stanley,   Arthur   Penrhyn,   77;    100; 

102;    152;   255;   344. 
Stansfield,  Sir  James,  155  ;   215. 
Statesmanship,  American,  406,  407. 
Stephen,  James  Fitzjames,  117  ;   133 ; 

167. 

Strachan,  Bishop,  461. 
Strahan  &  Paul,  289. 
Strathfieldsaye,  21. 
"Strawberry  Hill,"  144  et  seq. 
Stubbs,  William,  84 ;   277. 
Students,  American,  369. 
Suffrage,  the,  225. 
Sumner,  Charles,  344  ;  409. 
Sun,  the  New  York,  413. 
Swindon,  281. 
Syracuse  (the  Sicilian),  95. 


Tait,  Archbishop,  101 ;    103  ;    196. 

Talfourd,  Sir  T.  N.,  26. 

Taylor,  Bayard,  372. 

"Tea,  Afternoon,"  the  old-fashioned, 

280. 

Teck,  Prince,  313. 
Telepathy,  anecdote  of,  273. 
Temperance   movement   in   Ontario, 

the,  446. 

Temple.     See  Templer,  John  Charles. 
Temple,  Frederick  (Archbishop),  72. 
Templer,  John  Charles,  122. 
Tennyson,  142;  288. 
Thackeray,  W.  M.,  137. 
Theale,  parish  of,  55. 
Theatre,  the,  150. 
Thessiger,  Frederick,  166. 
Thirl  wall,  Bishop,  82. 
Thomas,  George  Henry,  345. 
Thomasson,  Thomas,  228 ;  364. 
Thomson,  William,  285. 
Tichborne  Case,  70. 
Tietjens,  Teresa,  151. 
Times,  281 ;  315. 
Titles  of  honour,  428. 
Tractarian  movement,  the,  60. 
Trade  unions,  228. 
Trent  affair,  the,  324. 
Trevelyan,  Sir  Charles,  203. 
Trials,  notable,  125-127. 
Tupper,  Sir  Charles,  437  ;   438. 
Twisleton,  Edward,  107 ;    109. 
Twiss,  Travers,  86. 
Tyndall,  John,  138. 


INDEX 


477 


IT 


Union  League,  the,  322. 

Unions,  Trade-,  295. 

"United     States,     The"      (Goldwin 

Smith's  book),  460. 
Universities,  Canadian,  461    et  seq.; 

Universities,  contrasted,  368. 
University.     See     under      "Oxford" 

and  under  "Commission." 
University  College,    Common   Room 

of,  75. 

University  Reform,  73. 
Upton  Manor  House,  14. 
Urquhart,  David,  136. 


V 


Vancouver  (British  Columbia),  422. 
Van  Home,  Sir  W.  C.,  419. 
Vaughan,   Henry  Halford,  93;    274; 

275. 
Venables,  George,   163 ;    epitaph  on, 

165;    331. 
Venice,  389. 
Verhuel,  Admiral,  291. 
Verney,  Lady,  93. 
Victoria    (British     Columbia),    420, 

421,  422. 
Victoria,  Queen,  45 ;   46 ;    155 ;    179  ; 

181;    314. 
Villiers,  C.  P.,  260. 
"Vivian  Grey,"  255. 
"Voyage  of  Captain  Popanilla,  The,' 

180;    182. 

W  . 

Waldegrave,    Frances,  Lady,   144    et 

seq. 

Waldron,  Gordon,  448. 
Walker,  Thomas,  170. 
Walrond,  Theodore,  219. 
Walsingham,  Sir  F.,  portrait  of,  148. 
Walter,  Count  of  Mantes,  93. 


Walter,  John,  27. 

Ward,  Sally.  See  Mrs.  Bigelow  Law- 
rence. 

Ward,  W.  G.,  61 ;   63  ;   73. 
Warde,  John,  12  ;    17. 
"Warfare  of  Science  and   Religion," 

66. 

Waring,  George,  278. 
Warren,  T.  Herbert,  381. 
Washington    (the    city),    352;     399; 

society  at,  407. 
Waterloo,  battle  of,  38  ;    160. 
Wayte,  S.  W.,  105. 

Webster,  Daniel,  45. 

Weekly  Sun,   the  [Toronto],  448. 

Welbeck,  192. 

Wellesley,  Gerald,  22. 

Wellington,  the  first  Duke  of,  21 ; 
102 ;  290  ;  resemblance  to  Grant, 
344. 

Wellington,  the  second  Duke  of,  24. 

Whist,  400. 

White,  Andrew  D.,  66 ;   366  ;   370. 

White  House,  a  presentation  at  the, 
402  ;  reception  at,  408. 

Wigan,  A.  S.,  151. 

Wilberforce,  Samuel,  Bishop  of  Ox- 
ford, 63;  83;  143. 

Wilder,  Professor  Burt  G.,  378-379. 

William  the  Conqueror,  93. 

William  III,  175. 

William  IV,  45. 

Williams,    Edward  Vaughan,    123. 

Williams,  Monier,  276. 

Wilson,  J.  M.,  278. 

Winkworth,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  364. 

Winnipeg,  416. 

Wolseley,  Lord,  189. 

Woman  suffrage,  360. 

Wright,  Mrs.  Atkins,  1. 

Wyburnbury,  5. 


Yarmouth  (Isle  of  Wight),  274. 


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